Differing Worldviews in Higher Education

Differing Worldviews in Higher Education

Differing Worldviews in Higher Education Two Scholars Argue Cooperatively About Justice Education

Four Arrows Fielding Graduate University, Santa Barbara, USA

Walter Block Loyola University, New Orleans, USA

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DEDICATION

Four Arrows thanks Chief Seattle for warning us that we would eventually learn that we cannot eat money. Walter Block thanks Adam Smith for his invisible hand, Friedrich Hayek for his spontaneous order and Murray Rothbard for blazing the path to Austro-libertarian anarcho capitalism. Both authors of this book would like to thank Walter Block’s Loyola University research assistants Maria Missura, Andrew Naquin and especially Michael O’Brien for help with references, proper headers, footers and pagination and other such copy editing matters.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

1. Introduction: An Intellectual Adventure.............................................................. 1 2. Academic Freedom.............................................................................................. 9 3. Ecological Justice .............................................................................................. 37 4. Wealth Distribution ......................................................................................... 113 5. A Case Study: Protesting Arizona’s Anti-hispanic Legislation....................... 173 6. Conclusion: Disagreement, Non-violence and Friendship .............................. 213 References............................................................................................................ 217 About the Authors ................................................................................................ 235

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INTRODUCTION An Intellectual Adventure

WHAT ARE THE GOALS FOR THIS BOOK?

We two authors, one an American Indian with an Indigenous worldview and a liberal inclination (Four Arrows), the other a Jewish atheist with a Western worldview and a libertarian orientation (Walter E. Block), employ “cooperative argumentation” to accomplish what an amazon.com reviewer said about a book on this topic (Makau and Marty, 2001): “Cooperative Argumentation gets us past the fighting in debate, and moves us toward the real power that can be found in understanding someone else’s argument.” In our book, this “power in understanding” refers specifically to one of the most controversial issues in higher education- the teaching of social justice. The specific problem we address relates to teaching for the sake of justice in the world. It is the stalemate that has essentially stifled authentic social justice education. The stalemate is a result of polemics on one side or the other that do not contribute sufficiently to real understanding. Both authors agree, although we acknowledge exceptions that will be noted later, that Silver’s (2007, pp. 535–550) central argument is largely valid. He points to the lack of historical analysis of the declared and tacit roles of higher education institutions with regard to society and social change. Although we do not intend such an analysis per se, we hope that our pursuit of truth will provide schools and teachers with a better understanding of why this topic is so controversial and what exactly the issues are so they can be better addressed in the classroom. Research in social justice education reveals a need for doing this (Kymlicka, 1998; Parker, 2001). Bickmore (2008, p. 162) states the need clearly: The need for teachers to develop the kinds of substantial knowledge bases that can invite and guides socially critical questioning and debate is probably more important and more difficult to remedy that is often acknowledges social education research. It requires sophisticated content knowledge for teachers to handle complex topics in a student centered and open (constructively conflictual) manner in light of global diversity and justice concerns. Simon (2001, p. 219) states that “instead of shying away from such controversy, it can serve as the motivation frame and quality control mechanism of teacher development” and we can help educators plunge headfirst into such opportunities. Before engaging in a dialogue about our disagreements on salient matters that pertain to this goal, we realize certain foundational agreements must be shared. For one, we agree that a “pursuit of truth” is more of a commitment to conversation 1

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than to finding some absolute premise. We thus employ Palmer’s (1998, p. 104) notion of truth in our dialogue: “truth is an eternal conversation about things that matter, conducted with passion and discipline.” We will do our best not to impose any a priori assumption about truth or validity, and will thus develop, defend or modify any position according to the “natural logic” our words convey or do not convey (Borel, 1989). Another agreed-upon assumption is that “argumentation should be valued as the elixir of life of participatory democracy” (Eemeren, 1995, p. 144). If argumentative discussion is to be such a vital tool for managing democratic processes, it must include critical, authentic, honest and open-minded dialogue and not merely a political monologue intended to demagogue the reader. In trying to respectfully and cooperatively argue “against” one another’s position, we of course will be conscious of the impact of our statements on the reader. Our goal, however, rather than a competitive “win,” as in a debate format, is that we truly want the reader to gain as much or more understanding about the topic as we hope to garner by writing about it. In this way all of us will be better able to make action-oriented decisions about higher education and Social, Economic and Ecological Justice (SEEJ) in the real world. We realize that in forensic, scholarly and political arguments, the all too usual practice is to vehemently represent a position and not to be conciliatory. We also know that both of our strong personalities and convictions as relate to the matters at hand require that any change in our current positions will have to be hard won. We do not see this as a deterrent to our cooperative goals. The dialectical norms of cooperation and rhetorical norms of zeal can be compatible (Leff, 1999). A third initial agreement as relates to our goals for this text is related to Coleman’s (1989, p. 197) observation that “consenting to a process is not the same thing as consenting to the outcomes of the process.” We have entered into this partnership fully aware of the large differences in our reasoning, premises, conclusions and interpretations about social and ecological justice agendas in higher education. Although we can hope to move to a third position, we neither expect for this to happen nor do we necessarily believe it to be ideal. Our fourth initial agreement is about an operational definition for SEEJ. This as it happens, is more difficult to do than would appear at first glance. One possible definition accepts that the ultimate vision for all three justice arenas (social, economic and ecological) relates to the pursuit of values resulting in a redistribution of economic, social and political resources. Thus, this first perspective agrees with the Environmental Protection Agency’s official definition for environmental justice as being sufficient for our definition for SEEJ in general. The EPA (n.d.) states: Environmental justice is the fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all people regardless of race, color, national origin, culture, education, or income with respect to the development, implementation, and enforcement of environmental laws, regulations, and policies. Fair Treatment means that no group of people, including racial, ethnic, or socioeconomic groups, should bear a disproportionate share of the negative environmental consequences resulting

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INTRODUCTION

from industrial, municipal, and commercial operations or the execution of federal, state, local, and tribal environmental programs and policies. We need only remove the word “environmental” to make this definition work sufficiently for its application to “social, economic and ecological” contexts for higher education. Thus, the first iteration of our working definition for SEEJ, adapted from the EPA, is as follows: Social, economic and ecological justice refers to the fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all people with respect to the development, implementation and enforcement of laws, regulations and policies. “Fair Treatment” means that no group of people should bear a disproportionate share of the negative consequences that result from industrial, municipal or commercial operations or the execution of local, state or federal laws or practices. But there are difficulties here. Walter believes that this definition is compatible with the philosophical vision of people on the left side of the political spectrum, only. Four Arrows is unsure about that claim, suspecting that the concept of “fair treatment” is less political than it is a core aspect of any definition relating to the idea of “justice.” Owing to this early disagreement about a working definition for SEEJ, accompanied by an agreement between us that the reader deserves at least some agreed upon parameters for our subject matter, we commence our dialogue in this Introduction. We do so in an effort to reveal some understanding for ourselves and the reader that will allow us to move forward in addressing the chapter topics. Walter: Social justice typically refers to affirmative action and non discrimination. But, in contrast, only free association is compatible with libertarianism. Here, people are free to discriminate against others on the basis of “race, color, national origin, culture, education, or income,” to say nothing of baldness, beauty (lookism), tastes in music or art or anything else under the sun. Economic justice supports egalitarianism and treating equals equally. But, in the laissez faire capitalist society, the only requirement is that no one may initiate violence against anyone else or his property. There is no necessity to treat anyone equally or fairly (assuming no fraud). Ecological justice is associated with forced recycling, prohibitions of private ownership of endangered species, and opposition to the privatization of forests, waterways, garbage dumps, etc. Whereas, again in sharp contrast, free market environmentalists analyze ecological difficulties as the result of government ownership or the tragedy of the (unowned) commons. And, it is a matter of sublime indifference whether or not “racial, ethnic, or socioeconomic groups, … bear a disproportionate share of the negative environmental consequences resulting from industrial, municipal, and commercial operations or the execution of federal, state, local, and tribal environmental programs and policies.” In the free market economy, there would not be any “negative environmental consequences resulting from industrial, municipal, and commercial operations.” There would be, moreover, the complete absence of any “federal, state, local and tribal” governmental “programs and policies.” 3

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How, then, to define SEEJ if the tradition approach outlined above will not suffice? One can resort to a second alternative. Here, we resort to a stipulative set of definitions: “Social justice” refers to plain old ordinary justice, only applied to social considerations; “economic justice” refers to plain old ordinary justice, only referring to economic issues; and “ecological justice” refers to plain old ordinary justice, only as it concerns environmental concerns. In this manner, we could have “baseball justice,” which, presumably, would refer to following the rules of this sport; or “music justice” which would apply to reading the score carefully, and playing the right notes. This is a bit silly, it must be conceded, because we have a perfectly good word for all of this, namely, plain old simple “justice,” and Occam’s Razor inclines us against all such multiplications of nomenclature. But, at least, this second perspective has the virtue of not offending any of the reaches of the political economic spectrum. Four Arrows: I disagree with a number of Walter’s assertions, such as his claim that in a free market economy there are no negative environmental consequences. This reminds me of a passage in his enchanting book, Defending the Undefendable, where he says there is nothing intrinsically wrong with littering (1976, p. 110). In light of the plastic debris problem in our oceans, a “tragedy of the commons,” I hope he will come to acknowledge during the writing of this present book that unregulated production, transportation and littering is a “tragedy of the commons” related to unregulated littering (as well as to the unrestricted production of plastic in the first place) at some later point in our text! At this point I think it is more important to focus on my possible agreements with him so we can move toward a mutually agreed upon definition of our terms. I am willing to agree that social, economic and ecological justice (SEEJ) is more about the problem of initiating violence against anyone than it is about egalitarianism. Also, I am in accord with him that when we invoke SEEJ, we are merely referring to the universally accepted concept of “justice” (the “plain, old, ordinary” kind) as applied to social, economic or ecological issues. So perhaps we have already accomplished something. Unfortunately, if our working definition of SEEJ were thus something like, “SEEJ refers to the avoidance or correction of acts of violence and the application of principles of justice to social, economic and ecological issues,” we would next have to agree on a definition for violence and a definition of “justice,” and this may also be difficult, especially if it brings us back to the concept of “fair treatment” on which Walter and I disagree. Beginning with defining violence, figuratively speaking, it is often equated with injustice and there we go again, as in “doing violence to the truth.” Webster’s Online Dictionary is equally ambiguous and defines violence as “injury by or as if by distortion, infringement or profanation” in addition to the “exertion of physical force so as to injure or abuse (n.d.).” The Violence Prevention Alliance of the World Health Organization defines violence as “the intentional use of physical force or power, threatened or actual, against oneself, another person, or against a group or community, that either results in or has a high likelihood of resulting in injury, death, psychological harm, 4

INTRODUCTION

maldevelopment, or deprivation.” It also refers to “collective violence “as “violence committed by larger groups of individuals and can be subdivided into social, political and economic violence (n.d.).” Finally, I refer to Silverstein’s (1971, p. 67) idea that people can suffer the effects of violence without “any change in the present situation, without any overt, physical action taking place.” He was referring to “status-quo” policies such as Jim Crow laws, etc. So I ask Walter, if we accept as a working definition what I suggested, i.e. that SEEJ refers to the avoidance or correction of acts of violence and the application of principles of justice as related to social, economic and ecological issues,” can he generally accept the possibilities above for defining the notions of violence and justice? I am willing to interpret the concepts implied by SEEJ as more about a process that can be best addressed on a case by case basis than in terms of a black and white definition. But in my judgment it must at least relate to a lack of violence and an application of justice that includes the ideas conveyed in the definitions generally associated with these two terms (violence and justice). Walter: I greatly appreciate Four Arrow’s characterization of my book Defending as “enchanting.” That book has been reviewed many a time without that adjective ever being applied to it. I will reserve discussion of what I meant there about littering, plastics in the oceans, the tragedy of the commons, government regulations and other environmental issues, until we reach the chapter of the present book that deals with these issues. I agree full well, and enthusiastically so, with Four Arrow’s contention that justice is intimately and negatively related to violence. At this point, I must throw a compliment his way. Initially I opposed placing a discussion of SEEJ definitions in this introduction. I thought we were so far apart that we should reserve our analysis of it to a later chapter, where we could adopt far more adversarial stances. But, he asked me to be patient, try it his way, and see if we couldn’t come to some sort of accord. He felt it important to at least define what we would be doing, at the outset. I complied with his request. I am surprised, I must admit, but glad I followed his lead in this regard, for now, with this equation of justice and lack of initiatory violence, I really think we have achieved his goal. I still maintain that this is a stipulative definition, not a reportive one, but we can more closely examine these issues later in the book. Challenges to SEEJ definitions have been and continue to be the starting point for disagreements about whether or not higher education should be in the business of promoting it. Volumes have been written about justice and social justice and we have no intention here of revisiting this literature, at least not in this introduction. Suffice it to say that we are fully aware that some, such as Hayek (1978, p. 69–70), believe that: In a system in which each is allowed to use his knowledge for his own purposes the concept of ‘social justice’ is necessarily empty and meaningless, because in it nobody’s will can determine the relative incomes of the different people, or prevent that they be partly dependent on accident. 5

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We are equally aware that others, like those members of the Council of Europe believe SEEJ is sufficiently understood so as to make it a priority for higher education. According to Harkavy and Huber (2007, p. 167): We subscribe to the responsibility of higher education to foster citizen commitment to sustainable public policies and actions that go beyond considerations of individual benefits. We accept our responsibility to safeguard democracy and promote a democratic culture by supporting and advancing within higher education as well as society at large, the principles of democratic and accountable structures, processes and practices; active democratic citizenship; human rights, mutual respect and social justice; environmental and social sustainability; dialogue and peaceful resolution of conflicts. However, we believe our definition allows for both opposing positions to make their arguments. Novak (n.d.), whose conservative views tend to support Hayek’s concerns, would appear to accept our definition as “ideologically neutral”: Social justice rightly understood is a specific habit of justice that is “social” in two senses. First, the skills it requires are those of inspiring, working with, and organizing others to accomplish together a work of justice. The second characteristic of “social justice rightly understood” is that it aims at the good of the city, not at the good of one agent only. One happy characteristic of this definition of the virtue of social justice is that it is ideologically neutral. It is as open to people on the left as on the right or in the center. Its field of activity may be literary, scientific, religious, political, economic, cultural, athletic, and so on, across the whole spectrum of human social activities. The virtue of social justice allows for people of good will to reach different—even opposing—practical judgments about the material content of the common good (ends) and how to get there (means). Such differences are the stuff of politics. THE BOOK’S FORMAT

For each chapter we engage one particular topic that generally falls under the umbrella of SEEJ. We will attempt to understand the other’s position and make whatever concessions to each other of which we may be convinced. We will interpret each other’s writing in the most sympathetic manner possible. We will assume good intentions on the part of the other guy. One of us will begin by offering our opinion along with some initial reasons and arguments for it. We will then engage in our dialogue. For balance, we will take turns in starting out the chapters, and ending them. This, at least, is the process we foresee in the writing of this book. But, as anyone who has ever written anything (and this includes shopping lists, too) knows full well, “there is always a slip between cup and lip”: the procedure of putting words on paper is a creative one. Issues arise while this occurs that may (or may not) alter initial intentions. 6

INTRODUCTION

In another book by Four Arrows, Counter-Friction (2011), issues pertaining to social and ecological justice in higher education are addressed in terms of power, politics and grassroots transformations of schools. In this book, we address the controversial subject matter that connects universities to the world at large in a way that allows the reader to understand the polarities that keep us from solving the crises we all face. We hope and trust, gentle reader, that you will enjoy reading our feeble, but best efforts at moving us that proverbial millionth of an inch closer to the Truth, whatever that is. We two authors have taken a chance with each other; we come from widely disparate parts of the political economic spectrum and yet have cooperated in this venture. If we can indeed attain that goal, perhaps it will pave the way for more such cooperation in future. Four Arrows, aka Don Trent Jacobs Walter E. Block

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ACADEMIC FREEDOM

Four Arrows’ Initial Position: I believe academic freedom is vital if state hegemony and its oppression are to ever be challenged so students can emerge from schooling prepared to think critically and participate reasonably in helping to achieve and maintain a relatively healthy world. Walter’s Initial Position: Academic freedom is a useless concept, generally used to rationalize socialistic teaching (indoctrination) endeavors. Walter: Academic freedom is a snare and a delusion. It is evidence of the insolence and gall of some academics. Those who favor it set themselves up for a fall. Why is there only such a thing as “academic freedom,” and no “plumber’s freedom,” or “taxi-cab driver’s freedom,” etc. Are only university professors deserving of “freedom”? Surely not. Forgetting for the moment whether we should favor this concept or not, what, literally, does it mean? Well, if it means anything, and it is unclear as to whether it does or not, it would appear to imply that the academic can do in class exactly what he wishes to do; otherwise, he is hardly “free.” (By analogy, plumber’s freedom would mean that the plumber, not the homeowner, would choose the type of facilities to be installed; tax driver’s freedom would enable the driver, not the customer, to determine the destination of the trip.) Webster’s New World College Dictionary defines the term as the “freedom of a teacher or student to hold and express views without fear of arbitrary interference by officials (n.d.).” But the weasel word, here, is “arbitrary.” No one would think that academic freedom gives a physicist the right to teach Shakespeare, or, a literary scholar justification to hold forth on planetary movements. May either of them, properly, address issues such as the justice of the U.S. role in Viet Nam, Afghanistan or Iraq? It is unclear as to whether this definition can shed any light on the matter. Perhaps, then, the phrase should not be taken so literally. Historically, “academic freedom” issues were highlighted during the McCarthy period, when professors were dismissed for discussing in a positive manner, or promoting, any idea opposed by those in power at the time. For example, consider this episode that occurred at Duke University. Hornell N. Hart, a Professor of Sociology there, published an essay entitled, “McCarthy versus the State Department,” against which Senator Joseph McCarthy took issue. He demanded that Duke squelch this publication. However, the president of that university, Arthur Hollis Edens (n.d.), wrote in response: It is axiomatic in University circles that a Professor has the right to pursue research investigations of his choice. So far as Professor Hart’s work is 9

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concerned, it will have to stand on its own merits and be measured by the rigid standards of truth, accuracy, sound scholarship and good taste, to which the works of all scholars are subjected. But, this cannot literally be true. Surely Edens would not have supported sociologist Hart, if the latter insisted on holding forth about chemistry, or economics, or music theory, instead of sticking to his own field of sociology, for the teaching of which, presumably, he was hired. Wherein does justice lie, in all of this? In my view, academic freedom should be seen as a matter of contract. Assume all universities, schools, are private, for simplicity’s sake if no other (For the libertarian, all public institutions of learning are per se unjust, in that they are financed through compulsory levies, e.g., taxes.). Suppose there was a Marxist or fundamentalist Christian college. Presumably, the overwhelming majority of its professoriate would be hired in order to promote that way of looking at the world and analyzing it. That is, the instructors would all be Marxists or fundamentalist Christians. (Possibly, each institution would want a bit of intellectual diversity represented on its faculty, just to keep students on their toes, but that would be strictly up to them, in the free or just society). Posit that the school hired a Marxist, and wanted him to teach Marxist economics. But, after he had been tenured, he converted to free enterprise, and desired to offer that perspective to his students, instead. The doctrine of “academic freedom” would give him the right to do precisely that. However, his contract with the Marxist administration would cut exactly in the opposite direction. Which is more just? Obviously, the contract, here, would trump any so called “academic freedom.” If this academic wishes to profess Austro-libertarianism, and thus support laissez faire capitalism, that is, of course his right. But not on the property of the Marxist University, and not in direct contravention of his contract with their administration. And the same goes, without any doubt, were the professor in question to switch from Austro-libertarianism to Marxism, or from fundamentalist Christianity to atheism, or to anything else other than the religious doctrine for the purpose of which he was hired to introduce his students. To insist that the atheist has a right, the “academic freedom,” to propound this doctrine at Fundamentalist Christian University is as silly as to say that the cab driver has the right to take the customer where he wants to go, and not to the destination of the man who flags down the taxi. The only exception to this general rule that I can see is the case where the university hires a professor to “engage in his academic freedom wherever it leads him.” This may or may not come with the side order condition that the academic, at least, has to stick to his own area of interest and, presumably, expertise. Should institutions of higher learning be in the business of teaching, exploring, studying justice, whether “social” or not? Of course they may, if they so desire. Such a decision in no way contravenes the twin libertarian axioms of non aggression and property rights, based on homesteading and legitimate title transfer (Nozick, 1974; Rothbard, 1973, 1982). Would it best be done only within a few narrowly limited academic departments (e.g., religion, philosophy), or should the topic be researched all throughout the curriculum? This is roughly equivalent, for the libertarian, to asking whether restaurants should feature red, blue or no tablecloths. The answer to 10

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the latter question is, Allow each eatery to decide this question for itself, and then the market will, presumably, pass judgment on their decisions through the profit and loss system. A similar analysis applies to the teaching industry. Each university should decide that issue for itself, and then sink or swim, at least to some extent, on the basis of it. One argument for ranging widely on issues of (social) justice is that most academic subjects at least impinge upon it to some degree. For example, in music, there arises the question of the justice of copyright; in mathematics and the physical sciences, the propriety of working for imperialistic powers; in engineering and computer science, the legitimacy of patents; in history and English literature, the issue of plagiarism. Similarly, numerous ethical issues arise in economics (is the minimum wage law that disproportionately unemploys young black males to be considered immoral?; in law (should those responsible for the deaths emanating from the prohibition of drugs and markets in used body parts – Barnett, 1988– be dealt with as murderers?), in sociology (is the male – female wage gap due to capitalist exploitation, or to asymmetric gender roles in the home which are voluntarily chosen?). On the other hand, it is the rare mathematician, chemist, musician, astronomer, etc., who has any but the most rudimentary and superficial training, or expertise in these matters. Allowing professors to deal with complex ethical issues runs the risk of allowing the blind to lead the blind. My claim is that it is all but impossible to come to any definitive a priori conclusion on this matter. All the more reason, then, for the marketplace, and the institutions of economic freedom, to sort it out. Four Arrows: Walter essentially puts forward one main argument against the concept of academic freedom and, implied by the context of our book’s subject matter, against the use of academic freedom to promote social and ecological justice in the classroom. He refers to the problem of arbitrariness in both defining and implementing academic freedom. For example, he believes it should be clear that a faculty hired by a religious university should not teach that which opposes the vision of that institution. He declares “no one would think that academic freedom gives a physicist the right to teach Shakespeare, or, a literary scholar justification to hold forth on planetary movements” and that neither should address issues such as the U.S. role in Iraq or Viet Nam. Ultimately, Walter contends that since no employee should have the freedom to do other than what his or her employer intended, it is best for “economic freedom” to ultimately sort out what is taught and how in higher education, implying that there is no rule or law called “academic freedom” that should circumvent the free market. I’m sure Walter will correct me if I am misinterpreting his words, but I think I am close enough to continue with an argument that I think reveals my understanding of his while at the same time offers not so much a rebuttal but a solution that dovetails his view with mine, if this is possible. First, allow me to point out that Webster’s use of “arbitrary” may not be such a “weasel word” as Walter contends. His black and white view that a physicist cannot teach Shakespeare, nor visa versa, etc., does not allow for the legitimate arbitrariness 11

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inherent in good, creative research and teaching. For example, Eric Lewin Altschuler (1998) explains, in a piece entitled, “Searching for Shakespeare in the Stars,” how Shakespeare’s frequent references to and knowledge of the physical sciences could shed light on controversies over his authorship of certain plays. I could see both a good teacher of Shakespeare as well as a fine physics instructor employ a related interdisciplinary study to inform and motivate students about either topic. I think, Walter, excellent teacher that he is, will also see this possibility. This, in my view, is the kind of arbitrary dynamics in academic freedom the dictionary referenced. It is the same theory that allows Walter to teach contrary to his own university’s vision and mission statements in support of his own version of social justice. Similarly, academic freedom allows both the physicist and the literature professor to teach their topics while at the same time stimulating critical inquiry regarding the U.S. role in Iraq or Viet Nam. There are many parallels to wars in Shakespeare’s time that could shed light on interpretations of this poet’s words and plots and morals, for example. And if the university vision statement endorsed social justice, I contend it would be a duty of the creative professor to find a way to marry an area of specialization to an exploration about whether or not the invasion of Iraq would have been a “just war” in the eyes of Shakespeare or not. Such possibilities challenge Walter’s declaration that Eden’s claim that a professor has a right to pursue research or teaching as he or she sees fit “cannot literally be true.” On the other hand, I find myself both understanding and agreeing with the essence of Walter’s primary argument. He believes that the employment contract should “trump” the professor’s rights. Keeping focused on our task to illuminate reasonable considerations about the role of higher education in promoting social, economic and ecological justice in the world, I would modify my support of academic freedom with the contingency that it exists if it relates to the vision statement. I believe that a professor within a college or university should not only be allowed to pursue SEEJ as he or she sees fit, but that the instructor, administration, students and staff have a duty to do so, but if and only if two conditions exist: 1. The institution’s vision statement directly asserts or indirectly implies an honouring of the greater public good or the well-being of every person. 2. The ideas presented are or can be relevant to a particular course and allow for, even encourage, alternative and critical perspectives. Both stipulations are supported by the “Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure” published by the American Association of University Professors in 1940; these remain a part of the AAUP precepts even today. The Statement aligns with the first stipulation as follows: Teachers are entitled to freedom in the classroom in discussing their subject, but they should be careful not to introduce into their teaching controversial matter which has no relation to their subject. My second stipulation for respecting academic freedom is addressed in the same section: Limitations of academic freedom because of religious or other aims of the institution should be clearly stated in writing at the time of the appointment. 12

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(The entire statement can be viewed online at the AAUP website. http:// www.aaup.org/AAUP/pubsres/policydocs/contents/1940statement.htm) Walter has told us that people should be free to discriminate against others. He objects, apparently, to the notion of academic freedom because it does not allow employers to dismiss faculty for not doing what the employer wants. He (1976, p. 51) has claimed that the colleges and universities allow its faculty: The freedom to teach the subject matter in whatever form the academic wishes to teach it, despite any wishes to the contrary his employer may harbor. Therefore, “academic freedom” prohibits the employer from firing the teacher as long as he teaches the subject matter, no matter how objectionable the teaching is. My two conditions would seem to solve this problem. Unless Walter (1976, 52) resorts to the kinds of examples he jokingly (?) used to represent degrees to which he contends academics violate principles of professionalism, such as a cartoon about a professor who uses academic freedom to defend teaching that John Wayne is the “father of NATO,” I cannot imagine a reasonable counter-argument if academic freedom is contingent on my two stipulations. Using the essence of a vision/mission statement might be a starting place if we can agree on a more reasonable conclusion about the majority of higher education faculty being capable of determining how to meet the vision statement via his or her field. Then it would follow that we could agree that the instructor would have the freedom teach about SEEJ and even advocate it, as long as scholarship includes alternative views and primary source research that engage students in critically understanding. Since this interpretation of higher education vision statements might be considered a possible point of weakness in my argument, allow me to give an example to show how difficult it would be to honestly misinterpret a vision statement enough to claim it does not advocate a mission in behalf of the greater public good or in behalf of all citizens equally. My illustration below uses the vision statement of the University of Georgia. I believe it represents a more conservative wording than exists in many institutions of higher education, yet it is still obvious that social justice is relevant to it. In the following example, I have underlined the phrase that I claim relates to the promotion of SEEJ as we have defined it in our introduction. Vision Statement: The University System of Georgia will create a more educated Georgian, well prepared for a global, technological society, by providing firstrate undergraduate and graduate education, leading-edge research, and committed public service. Since public service is to promote the benefit of the public, not of one segment of it only, I contend that the concept of fair treatment is inherent in the idea. Thus a SEEJ agenda would be appropriate for this university. The Mission Statement further supports this contention. Mission Statement: The mission of the University System of Georgia is to contribute to the educational, cultural, economic, and social advancement of 13

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Georgia by providing excellent undergraduate general education and firstrate programs leading to associate, baccalaureate, masters, professional, and doctorate degrees; by pursuing leading-edge basic and applied research, scholarly inquiry, and creative endeavors; and by bringing these intellectual resources, and those of the public libraries, to bear on the economic development of the State and the continuing education of its citizens. Each institution in the University System of Georgia will be characterized by “Cultural, ethnic, racial, and gender diversity in the faculty, staff, and student body, supported by practices and programs that embody the ideals of an open, democratic, and global society. (See http://www.usg.edu/regents/vision_mission_goals/) These words refer to all of Georgia and all of its citizens, thus the “greater good” and “fair treatment” that are inferred. It even goes so far as to mention cultural, ethnic, racial and gender diversity in the university and it would be wrongheaded to believe such goals would not be applicable to the larger society. Finally, it supports the “ideals” of a democratic society. Admittedly, this concept is surrounded by controversy and interpretation, but we can get a good sense of U of G’s meaning for it via its vision and mission statements. Few college or university vision statements are obviously neutral about making the world a better place for all. The University of California’s mission statement, which seems to do its best to remain neutral, still refers to the goal of working toward “improvements in the quality of life (n.d.)” and no serious investigator would be able to prove that the intention did not apply to all people equally. I hope to learn through Walter’s response how his position and mine might have common ground. Academic freedom is an important concept according to most universities, most faculty and students, and most Supreme Court rulings. When it is ignored, at best, faculty risk losing tenure or failing to gain promotion. At worst are the many historical and contemporary international examples of imprisonment and death to those professors whose work challenges state or corporate hegemony. I hope we can all make room for subjectivity in higher education that is based on reason, reflection on experience, dialogue and primary source research. This means moving beyond the illusion of “the myth of objectivity” that is often used to curtail academic freedom and maintain the status quo. David Horowitz’s book, Indoctrination U.: The Left’s War Against Academic Freedom, is but one of many examples of using the cover of the myth of objectivity to prevent this kind of examination of the status quo: For academic radicals who hope to “change the world,” teaching is not a disinterested intellectual inquiry but a form of political combat. The banner of this combat is “social justice,” the emblem that signifies to the post-Communist left the triumph of the oppressed over the oppressors (Horowitz, 2007, p. xxvi). Bias exists and facts never speak for themselves. Our preconceptions, assumptions, values and politics are part of the lens through which we see the world (Clouser, 1991). The goals of academic freedom are to help assure that these things are exposed, realized, discussed, and, eventually, based on scholarship. If truth is, as Parker Palmer’s quote in the Introduction states - “an eternal conversation about 14

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things that matter, conducted with passion and discipline,” then the lack of authenticity behind “disinterested intellectual inquiry” will not likely allow anyone to come close to it. Walter ended his opening statement with his claim that “it is all but impossible to come to any definitive a priori conclusion on this matter.” I assert that this supports Webster’s reference to arbitrariness and the need to have institutions of learning where creative inquiry exists for the sake of new knowledge. I end with a quote from the original 1915 statement of the AAUP that has withstood the test of time. In a world where violence against nature and others is widespread and new creative solutions are largely absent, I think it is worth another read. Higher education should be an intellectual experiment station, where new ideas may germinate and where their fruit, though still distasteful to the community as a whole, may be allowed to ripen until finally, perchance, it may become a part of the accepted intellectual food of the nation or of the world (AAUP, 1915, 1940). Walter: A minor clarification: Four Arrows attributes to me the view that “no employee should have the freedom to do other than what his or her employer intended.” The way I see matters, it is not that the employer dictates to the employee, or, even the other way around; rather, a contract between them embodies the view of both of them. The bargaining process between the two of them should determine what the professor teaches. As for Four Arrows’ point about “Searching for Shakespeare in the Stars,” yes, there is such a thing as interdisciplinarity. I have no doubt that, to take an example from my own discipline, an economist specializing in the sub field of law and economics could indeed teach a course in law; and, also, a law professor with some background in the dismal science could do a pretty good job at this course as well. But, it seems to stretch matters quite a bit to suppose that a man with a Ph.D. in literature, and perhaps no physics courses at all, could be a good instructor in that science, and the opposite holds as well. I go further: if there were a private university that mixed and matched in this manner, and did such things all throughout its curriculum, I predict it would soon go broke, and good riddance to it, too. I cannot see my way clear to agreeing with Four Arrows’ claim that “both the physicist and the literature professor (could) teach their topics while at the same time stimulating critical inquiry into the U.S. role in Iraq or Viet Nam.” It seems to me that this claim fails to take into account the complexity of foreign policy, and the importance of specialization and the division of labor in all matters, certainly including the intellectual. In order to be a good physicist, one must carefully study this discipline. That leaves precious time to acquaint oneself with the niceties of war in the middle or Far East. It is not for nothing that LeBron James is a lousy cellist, and Michael Phelps cannot play the clarinet at all. The former spends most of his professional time pursuing basketball, and the latter is a denizen of the swimming pool. How could these athletes possibly be highly skilled in these musical pursuits, too? Why should academics be any different? Of course, this is not to say that some, few, academics, may be expert in fields for which they have no credentials. 15

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They might well have carefully studied these other disciplines. I am, after all, merely making a generalization, which certainly admits of exceptions. However, I join with Four Arrows, and enthusiastically so, when he underscores the importance of contract. But, I fear, he takes most or all of this back when he says: Simply put, I believe that a professor within a college or university should not only be allowed to pursue SEEJ as he or she sees fit, but that the instructor, administration, students and staff have a duty to do so, but if and only if two conditions exist: The institution’s vision statement directly asserts or indirectly implies an honouring of the greater public good or the well-being of every person. The ideas presented are or can be relevant to a particular venue and allow for, even encourage, alternative and critical perspectives. First, this should be up to the contract, should it not? Yes, if this agreement requires all professors to promote social justice, then, indubitably, they should do so. But, surely, the market place would reject an institution that weighs down mathematics professors with the obligation to focus on SEEJ. Second, it seems likely that the math instructor can better promote human well-being by sticking to his expertise, than by waxing on about areas far removed from his specialty. Further, I do not agree that there is or can be anything such as the “public good.” In my view, there are only private goods. Four Arrows goes on to support the “Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure” published by the American Association of University Professors in 1940: Teachers are entitled to freedom in the classroom in discussing their subject, but they should be careful not to introduce into their teaching controversial matter which has no relation to their subject. My question is, How can this be made to square with the idea of contract? University X may have signed a contract with Professor Y to the effect that he may, and indeed is encouraged to lecture about matters that have “no relation to his subject.” The marketplace may well reject an institution of higher learning with such a policy, but that is entirely a separate matter. Surely, X and Y have a right to sign such a contract. As well, I see as problematic the other clause, regarding freedom of professors to discuss their subjects. In the regard, an interesting issue has arisen in Canadian higher education. The Canadian Association of University Teachers (CAUT) has criticized Trinity Western University in British Columbia, for requiring all faculty to sign a statement of Christian faith as a pre-condition of employment. Here, “Teachers are not entitled to freedom in the classroom in discussing their subject,” contrary to the “Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure” of the AAUP. According to the executive director of CAUT, his organization’s condemnation of any school which enforces a religious loyalty oath “is not about faculty having to sign a statement of faith before being hired. A university is meant as a place to explore ideas, not to create disciples of Christ (Gilbert, 2010).” Sez him. Who is he 16

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and his organization to impose his views on two contracting parties, Trinity Western University (TWU), and the scholars who sign on to its policies? That agreement is a capitalist act between consenting adults, and ought not to be abrogated by CAUT, an outside party (Of course, to the extent that CAUT sees itself as a private certification body, it should be free to condemn any policy not to its liking, and to inform others of its determinations). Nor is this type of threat without barbs. Until the Supreme Court of Canada intervened on TWU’s behalf, the B.C. College of Teachers – a sister organization to CAUT at least in terms of philosophy – removed TWU’s accreditation; it’s graduates were not allowed to teach in provincial high schools due to the supposed “anti-homosexual agenda” of its curriculum; that is, its Christian philosophy. While an avowedly Christian University such as TWU will of course “encourage alternative and critical perspectives” on some issues, it will most certainly not do so on others. Is that its right? Of course it is, the AAUP’s “Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure” to the contrary notwithstanding. Thus, Four Arrows and I cannot at all “agree that the instructor would have the freedom teach about SEEJ and even advocate it, as long as scholarship includes alternative views and primary source research that engage students in critically understanding.” This would be in direct contravention of the contract TWU has made with its faculty, and it is entirely just that this Christian institution of higher learning have precisely that right. I must also take issue with Four Arrows’ statement to the effect that teaching be in “behalf of all citizens equally,” and support “public service … to promote the benefit of the public, not of one segment of it only.” The mission of TWU, and other religiously oriented colleges, is to promote the welfare of a narrow segment of the overall population. Is it not just that it be allowed to do so? Why should this firm be forced to serve everyone, let alone “equally”? In the free society, no restaurant, steel mill or grocery is concerned with the entire population; only with their own customers. Four Arrows weighs in on behalf of “cultural, ethnic, racial and gender diversity” and democracy. I have great difficulty with all of these concepts, at least when they are forced down the throats of those who are unwilling to embrace them. There are institutions of higher learning that reject all of them. On what ground are we to say them nay? Suppose I were to start up Blockhead University, and limit its faculty and student body to people of only one homogeneous “cultural, ethnic, racial and gender” category. I do so with my own honestly earned money. I reject the notion that to do so would be unjust. And, as for democracy, I accept this institution if there is unanimous agreement to vote in the first place, as in the case of a voluntary club, or condominium association. But this does not at all apply to any polity that people didn’t agree to join in the first place, and must thus be rejected as unjust. There is, after all, such a thing as the tyranny of the majority. Further, Hitler came to power through democratic means; so much for democracy. (For a thorough going critique of this institution, see Hoppe, 2001.) As for “faculty being subtly threatened with not getting tenure or promotions,” the overwhelming majority of such cases concern conservative and libertarian 17

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professors being booted out of the academy for not toeing the “social justice” line on such things as socialism, cultural, ethnic, racial and gender diversity, and democracy. The Horowitz book, I think, is highly accurate in its assessment of this situation. Four Arrows ends his section of this chapter with the following quote: It should be an intellectual experiment station, where new ideas may germinate and where their fruit, though still distasteful to the community as a whole, may be allowed to ripen until finally, perchance, it may become a part of the accepted intellectual food of the nation or of the world (AAUP, 1915, 1940). My own reaction to this statement is that I would like to attend a university, whether as student or faculty member, that embodied this goal. But I know of no cases where this ideal is actually respected. However, I think it a matter of elemental justice that universities, such as the religiously oriented, that explicitly reject this viewpoint, also be allowed to operate. Four Arrows: I concede that I may have overemphasized the interdisciplinary opportunity to teach SEEJ in courses not generally associated with it. I was only trying to demonstrate to Walter that it could be done and should be attempted if so doing does not detract from the main course objectives and if the school’s vision statement so warrants. Of course it would be inappropriate if a music teacher spent more time teaching about social justice than about notes, clefs and rhythm, given that the music oriented goals for the class would then be compromised. I also agree with Walter that the professor of music would likely have minimal expertise in social or ecological justice issues. However, not subscribing to the expert, top-down “sage on the stage” model of teaching, and preferring the “guide on the side” collaboration model, I do not worry too much about a lack of expertise in SEEJ. Research of primary source documents and good teaching can enhance a student’s learning about SEEJ if a master teacher, in any field, properly connects SEEJ to his or her course. There is a great difference between being a good physicist and a good teacher of physics. In any case, I did not mean to imply that any blending of one’s field of instruction with SEEJ awareness should be the mainstay of a course that is not normally an alignment with such issues and I concede this point to Walter. Walter also takes issue with my statement to the effect that teaching be in “behalf of all citizens equally,” and support “public service … to promote the benefit of the public, not of one segment of it only.” He asks the question, “If the mission of TWU, and other religiously oriented colleges, is to promote the welfare of a narrow segment of the overall population, is it not just that it be allowed to do so? However, he seems to have missed my entire point, that if the institution’s vision statement supports a religious mission, then it is entirely acceptable for professors to act in accord with it. On the other hand, if the vision statement of the university upholds an SEEJ agenda, then this too would be justified. Walter’s position thus implies that he agrees with my claim that vision or mission statements ought to be the determining factor in whether or not a university target SEEJ goals. So my answer to his question is, Yes. It is just that a university be allowed, even encouraged to follow its vision or mission statement. It follows that if such a statement promotes the 18

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general welfare of the citizenry or specifically refers to social or ecological well being or justice, then so be it. So it seems, at this point, that Walter and I are in agreement on this vital point! Before I move to my most important concern with Walter’s position, I wish to challenge his claim that the “overwhelming majority of such cases concerns conservative and libertarian professors being booted out of the academy for not toeing the social justice lines.” I just spent about 20 minutes on both the Wilson database and Google searching cases in which teachers were fired for their political views. I grant that most of these incidents related to K-12 education but I also submit that the same forces exist in higher education. I found only two conservative teachers who were dismissed. Both of these cases related to Christian fundamentalist teachers. There were fourteen situations in which a teacher had been fired for promoting anti-establishment perspectives, such as teaching students to think critically about war, family planning, homophobia, Christian fundamentalism and even one for showing movies with a liberal slant. I would think this finding would be supported by any serious student of educational history. Censorship of and sanctions against those teachers who have challenged a state’s agenda or the dominant group’s ideology have always been at risk, not just in the U.S., but throughout the world. I must respectfully ask Walter to offer evidence for his claim or that of Horowitz, even if it is necessary for us both to create an annotated bibliography of citations to support our opposing notions. Most professors or teachers in public schools are threatened when they attempt education that challenges state hegemony worldwide. The loss of academic freedom continues to result in many people being imprisoned for teaching students to think critically in ways that can challenge those in power. I beseech Walter to acknowledge such “liberal” teaching is far more likely to lead to problems than teaching “conservative” or status quo perspectives alone! Or, at least, help me better understand his claims and thinking in this regard for clarification to me and our readers. Although I feel more emotion about the aforementioned topic, the more important question has to do with my position that a vision statement is a contract of sorts that provides the basis for a faculty teaching goals. As I said, I agree with Walter that “Blockhead University,” has a right as a private institution to have its own agenda, but it is the vision statement that is more likely to advertise the owner’s purpose than individual employment contracts. I said a teacher would have a responsibility to address SEEJ if it was relevant to the course of study and if “the institution’s vision statement directly asserts or indirectly implies an honouring of the greater public good or the well-being of every person.” Moving on to Walter’s question, “this should be up to the contract, should it not?” I have to ask him why he seems to be ignoring my contingency relating to the vision and mission statements? I can only assume that, in spite of his own example relating to the religious school being able to adhere to its principles based on a mission statement, he feels the employment contract is a necessary requirement. Perhaps he sees no connection between the vision and mission and the school’s employment contract? I looked at a number of faculty employment contracts online. Most made no mention of the vision statement per se; however many required that the institution’s rules and 19

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regulations be followed. I did find one that specifically required a commitment to the university’s “vision statement and core values.” Nonetheless, since most employment contracts are not that detailed about anything relating to curriculum, it would seem that following the university vision statement would, at least in spirit, come close enough to Walter’s regard for employment contract to warrant some concession to my stipulations. If Walter’s only reluctance to take cognizance of the implied contractual relevance of the vision and mission statement to a faculty’s employment contract relates to his belief that there cannot be anything such as the public good and that “there are only private goods,” then in our next chapter about a university’s SEEJ obligations relating to the environment I will ask him if he believes the commons, e.g., fresh air, clean water, unpolluted rivers and oceans, public parks, etc., should be considered merely “private goods.” To dismiss my idea that academic freedom to teach should be dependent on the goals of a university or college vision statement’s reference to the “public good” because he believes there should only be private goods, is a topic of vital concern. However, since most public goods or commons relate to our natural resources, I can delay this conversation until our next chapter. I close with a reiteration of my important questions for Walter’s clarification or perhaps a modification of a position or phrasing: 1. Does he truly believe that more conservative oriented educators are fired, censored, imprisoned, killed or otherwise intimidate than liberal ones, now and throughout history and if so, can he support his position? (Truly, I must say I dislike the labels, “right and left” and “conservative and liberal” and hope we can do our best to avoid using them in the future.) 2. How far away is Walter’s reliance on a faculty’s employment contract from my stipulation relating to the institution’s vision and mission statements, regardless of whether the actual signed contract refers to them? 3. And, for the next chapter, can he explain why the commons cannot exist or be for the benefit of the public good? Walter: Four Arrows says it would be inappropriate for a music professor to spend more time teaching about social justice than music. In my view, this need not necessarily be “inappropriate.” It all depends upon the contract between university and professor. If the school really believes in academic freedom, and interprets this in the manner I have been doing, then the music teach may indeed properly address the issues of justice, or physics, or whatever. I only cast doubt on the economic viability of a college that allows this sort of thing. I have never heard it expressed in quite this manner before, but, I certainly am an advocate of the “sage on the stage” model of teaching rather than the “guide on the side” collaboration scenario. If I want to learn how to speak Spanish, or to do a heart transplant, or engage in chemical experiments, I would vastly prefer to be taught by someone who knows full well what they are doing, who can get up on the “stage” and pontificate, who will not merely “collaborate” with me, a mere ignoramus on these (and many other) subjects. Thus, I do worry quite a bit about 20

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a lack of expertise in justice issues on the part of the expert in physics, or music. But, I certainly agree with Four Arrows, and enthusiastically so, that there is a “great difference between being a ‘good physicist’ and a good teacher of physics.” My co author takes me to task for saying that the “overwhelming majority of such cases concerns conservative and libertarian professors being booted out of the academy for not toeing the social justice lines.” Much to my dismay, I fear he is in the right, and I, in the wrong. I thus stand corrected by him on this matter. I have no evidence to buttress this claim of mine. What I should have said, instead, is that the reason it is so difficult to find evidence of conservative and libertarian professors being booted out of the academy is because there are so few of them there in the first place. In other words, it is not the case that those who do not toe the left-liberal line on social justice are first allowed into the professoriate, and then dismissed from it. Rather, they are not even offered entry, at the outset. The evidence for this is very clear, and, indeed, overwhelming, whether measured in terms of viewpoints of the faculty, or their financial contributions, or invitees to graduation ceremonies (Spartacus, 2004, 2005; Kennedy, 2005; Miron, 2006, Conservapedia, 2010, Karni, 2007; Horowitz, 2003). For example, according the left liberal-biased New York Times: “The ratio of Democratic to Republican professors ranged from 3 to 1 among economists to 30 to 1 among anthropologists.” Support for the Democratic Party is a reasonably good proxy for adherence to left liberal viewpoints, as is association with the Republican Party evidence of a right wing or conservative philosophy. This leaves out libertarians, who are usually (Ron Paul is an exception) linked with neither party. A similar disparity exists in departments of sociology, philosophy, history, religion, political science, and an even greater bias exists in feminist studies, black studies, queer studies, multicultural studies. And, according to Klein, “Screened out, expelled or self-sorted, they tend to land outside of academia because the crucial decisions — awarding tenure and promotions, choosing which papers get published — are made by colleagues hostile to their political views (Blog from the Core, 2004).” In the view of Rothman, Nevitte and Lichter (2005) this phenomenon is by no means limited to social scientist and liberal arts professors; it has infected the hard sciences as well: “three out of four biologists and computer scientists now place themselves to the left of center, as do about two thirds of mathematicians, chemists, and physicists.” According to the findings of these authors, the rot afflicts physicists by a ten to one ratio of Democrats to Republicans. I really do not see how it can be denied that the university campus (my knowledge of the K-12 situation in this regard is inadequate; I bow to Four Arrows’ superior information in this realm) is almost an entirely owned branch plant of the left. What happened to Larry Summers, former president of Harvard, is very instructive, and is but the tip of the iceberg. For merely speculating about the possibility of male-female discrepancies in mathematics and physics accomplishments stemming even partially from the biological make up of human beings, he was drummed off campus. A lesser well known bit of evidence for this contention emanates from yet another highly prestigious university. According to Simon: Early last year Yale University returned a $20 million gift from alumnus Lee Bass rather than honor his request that the money be used for a course of studies 21

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in Western civilization. The incident spoke volumes about the intellectual and moral bankruptcy that has swept the U.S. academic community. Yale is so strapped for cash it has had to defer $1 billion in maintenance and has closed two departments. Yet, the school apparently would rather turn its back on $20 million than offend the forces of ‘political correctness” and offer a course in the civilization that gave it birth (1996, p. 21; see also Bass, 1995). There are, of course, cases that appear to be on the other side of the ledger. For instance, feminist and lesbian theologian Mary Daly was seemingly fired from Boston College for her socialist views (Autostraddle, 2010). But, not so, not so. Professor Daly was, rather, dismissed because she would not allow any male students to enroll in her classes, contrary to explicit college rules. She could have continued to wax eloquent about her “Gyn/Ecology” perspective had she not insisted upon this exclusion. I do have some anecdotal evidence to support the claim that upon occasion, critics of the left wing version of social justice are first given jobs, and then, unfairly, denied tenure: my own case. I taught at Holy Cross College from 1991–1997; my publications during that time were greater than any other member of my eleven person department, and, appeared in many of the same journals. Indeed, the number of my publications was almost equal to all of them put together. My teaching evaluations were severely criticized by members of the tenure and promotion committee that dismissed me; but they refused to compare them with those of other members of my department, nor with all others from the entire college who received tenure in that year. If that is not a case of a “libertarian professor being booted out of the academy for not toeing the social justice lines” then nothing is. A much more famous case concerned Michael Levin. He published a book on a subject other than what he taught at his university (philosophy), never mentioned this topic in class, and yet suffered a threat to his tenure, which he successfully fought in court at great personal cost (Hays, 1991). As to “vision statements,” I do not take them seriously for any purpose; I certainly do not think they serve as, even, implicit contracts. Virtually all of them are blatant lies. Were they to accurately reflect what actually goes on in most prestigious universities, as opposed to expressing their pious and irrelevant hopes regarding knowledge, justice, understanding, etc., they would say something like this: “We are going to charge you some $50,000 per year for four years of tuition and room and board, and, in return, we are going to indoctrinate your children with feminism, Marxism, anti white racism, the homosexual agenda, multiculturalism, social justice, Keynesianism, obscurantism and other varieties of political correctness. Period.” Four Arrows closes with three questions. My answer to the first is that I misspoke. I was in error when I claimed that “conservative oriented educators are fired and censored.” There are too few of them on campus for that. Rather, they are not for the most part hired in the first place. (I never claimed they were imprisoned, killed; certainly not in this country.) They are not so much censored as self-censored. My response to the second is that a vision statement is not a contract. No one was ever fired for its violation. However, I concede to Four Arrows, it has some quasi contract aspects: the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) has 22

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successfully sued numerous institutions of higher learning for their trashing of the free speech rights of conservative and libertarian students and professors on campus. As to the third, regarding the public good, the commons, and fresh air, clean water, unpolluted rivers and oceans, public parks, etc., I entirely agree with Four Arrows that we should defer their discussion until we reach our chapters on environmentalism. Four Arrows: I appreciate that Walter has retracted his claim that more right wing faculty are fired or otherwise terminated worldwide than those with a more liberal persuasion; however his fall back position cannot go unchallenged. If we cannot, in good faith, offer counter-evidence to one another, how else shall we use reason in our mutual search for truth and understanding in the other’s position? In this instance, Walter’s claim that there is a left wing bias in universities may or may not be true because the sources he used to establish it are not sufficiently scholarly. My co-author’s assertion is based on opinion pieces, blogs, publications of conservative think tanks, or are written by professors whose relevant studies were sponsored by a conservative organization. Referring to the latter, Stanley Rothman, S. Robert Lichter and Neil Nevitte’s original study, the one referenced by Walter about the “Politics and Professional Advancement Among College Faculty,” was sponsored by the Randolph Foundation, a private philanthropy that funds conservative organizations such as Americans for Tax Reform, the Independent Women’s Forum, and right-wing pundit David Horowitz’s Center for the Study of Popular Culture. If this is not bad enough, the conclusions to which Rothman et al. refers concerning a shift from right to left and a bias against the right among professors emanated from a study that asked questions in two entirely different ways in the two comparative studies, one requesting respondents to place themselves on a ten-point scale, and one asking them to select from a list of descriptions. This does not mean such a shift did not happen, only that there is no way to know if it did based on the data they offer. Furthermore, the original 1984 study involved three times the number of observations of the later study and involved two-year community colleges, whereas the latter included only research institutions. It is well known that people with more education are more likely to be left leaning, so showing that four year colleges have more left leaning folks that two year institutions should occasion no surprise; such a “study” demonstrates no bias at all. Nor do these authors provide any actual evidence to show that conservative Ph.D.s were denied positions or tenure more than liberal ones. (For more details on this, see the full rejoinder, see: http://mediamatters.org/research/ 200504050002.) This topic is only important insofar as many of the challenges to academic freedom from the right are based on the belief that professors are using it to indoctrinate students into left-wing ideologies. Walter feels the way he does because of his own personal experience. His story about the challenges to his tenure he experienced in spite of his publications, however, is paralleled by a similar story I could share about obstacles I faced at Northern Arizona University. I questioned the conclusions surrounding 9/11 and challenged the reasons for going into Iraq, and almost lost my tenure appointment over these episodes. I feel the logical conclusion cannot be 23

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as much about our opposing political views as our willingness to express them or our tendencies to go outside the acceptable limits of the perceived status quo. This might be informative for our chapter on academic freedom, but hardly supports a dismissal of it. I am much more interested in Walter’s blatant dismissal of vision statements. He says, “As to ‘vision statements,’ I do not take them seriously for any purpose; I certainly do not think they serve as, even, implicit contracts.” How does this square with his earlier statement that if a private school’s mission statement supported the right to talk about a topic, it should be able to do so? Such contradictions are typical in any fundamentalist ideology it seems to me, whether religion or libertarianism. Now, I could agree with my colleague that most universities and colleges tend to not follow them and that therefore, as Walter contends, they wind up being “lies.” But this alone does not warrant dismissing the stated goals of every university or college nor the hard work of many intelligent and well-intentioned people who created them. What I do not understand about Walter’s position here relates to our agreement that social and ecological justice is about preventing violence against others in the world. Since most of the vision statements relate to education as an opportunity to improve the well-being of citizens, developing dispositions and knowledge with which to gain it (which has to include stopping violence), I must know what Walter believes is the purpose of a university or, at least, why he feels one does not have the right to aspire toward its convictions?! An inability to accomplish a goal should not be an indictment against the goal itself or against those who are sincerely working toward it. And what is the alternative? Is the only true purpose in the universities and colleges with social justice oriented visions to grant credentials for those who can, without a conscious awareness of the violence against homosexuals, women, social justice and the other things Walter dismissed, go forth and blindly serve those that are responsible for the violence?! Walter: I regard Four Arrows as my mentor in this project. ‘Twas he who approached me about working with him on this, not the other way around. I am (happily) riding on his coat tails in this regard. I am not fully satisfied with this chapter as it now stands because, I believe we (me, mainly) have not fully adhered to one of the principles Four Arrows emphasized to me at the outset of our collaboration. He said there are plenty of debate format books out there, where scholars of differing opinions “have at it” with each other. We recognized, early on, that given the disparity of our views, we could not entirely ignore that element in this book. Nor was this all to the bad. An honest debate, where each person took seriously the views of the other, is rarely attained. All too often, debates consist of opponents shouting at each other, trying to score cheap points against one another, and as far as promoting understanding is concerned, they pass each other as “ships in the night.” However, in Four Arrows’ view, and I am sure he will correct me if I misunderstand him on this point, our book should attempt to be something more than that: we would also strive mightily to reconcile our positions with those of the other guy. 24

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So, let me try to do just that, more explicitly. I now more clearly see his point about which type of professors suffer what types of outrage. He is taking more of a global view of this issue, whereas, in my own mind’s eye, I was thinking virtually only of the U.S. (and to a lesser extent, Canada). Walking in his moccasins, I agree with him: at times, in at least some nations, leftist professors have indeed suffered more indignities in many (non Communist-socialist) countries than those who advocate “free market corporatism.” (I regard this phrase as a veritable contradiction in terms, such as square circle, or tall short man. But, I will reserve my explanation for a future chapter when we deal with economic issues. Hey, we have got to keep the customers interested.) For example, during the time of Pinochet in Chile, a professor espousing views not all that distant from mine (e.g., those of the “Chicago boys”) would have been given at least a lukewarm welcome; regarding those promoting the vision of Allende, loss of tenure or promotion would have been the least of their worries. Four Arrows: Perhaps it was Keynes who stated, “When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?”. I now ask my esteemed co-author this question. In gracefully admitting that more liberal professors are taken to task in education worldwide, including imprisonment, etc., than those who support the status quo free market corporatism that pervades the world, what mind change occurs? Homophobia and violence against gays and lesbians continues unabated; women remain oppressed; gaps between executive pay and employee pay continue to rise; ecological violence in spite of scientific warnings seems unstoppable. After agreeing that folks in education who are trying to address these issues are more likely to be removed one way or the other than those in support of them, what mind change is happening? I must respectfully ask this of my colleague who has caused me to change my mind about the right of a private college to allow its vision statement or employment contract to override academic freedom. I appreciate Walter’s reminder to us both about our goals in this book regarding not merely hammering our views at each other and shouting each other down, so to speak. We are, I am sure, working hard at trying to understand the truth in one another’s views, and we need to do our best not adopt the tactics that both left and right wing “arguers” all too often employ. In any case, I think academic freedom should apply to everyone, whatever their political views and to whatever degree one university or another is stacked with either left or right wing folks. (I also detest these polarized positions and hope we eventually shake them off, except to the degree that an eagle needs both wings to fly.). Nonetheless, if we are going to support our ideas in ways that the other might be able to understand them, we must buttress them with data that holds up to scrutiny and we are obligated to challenge one another, albeit respectfully. With this in mind, I want to bring a sharper focus to our various views, as I now understand them, relating to academic freedom and its role in helping us answer the question about whether or not higher education should address SEEJ issues. Walter will then comment on, clarify or add to my interpretations before we move on to our related discussion about the environment, commons, public good and private ownership in the next chapter. 25

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First, because I appreciate Walter’s sense about the college or university, private or public, being somewhat like a business, I offered the vision/mission statements as a basis for whether or not the school should/could address SEEJ in its curriculum. Walter’s responses, which I am desperately trying to understand, remain paradoxical to me. First, he dismisses vision statements as entirely useless in the same way as he rejects the concept of academic freedom, saying that the employment contract alone should determine whether or not a faculty has the freedom to teach a particular topic. However, he also relied on the mission statement of a private, religious university to support his claim that it should not be forced to teach SEEJ ideas that are contrary to its religious mission. Which is it Walter? Second, Walter, although he feels the concept of academic freedom is a “snare and a delusion,” seems concerned about the possibility (whether or not it is true) that left-wing ideologies are doing a disservice to higher education. At the same time he granted that worldwide, such ideologies are punished by those in control of universities, ending his last comment with a reference about how difficult it would have been to criticize Pinochet during his time in Chile. So I ask my esteemed colleague to help me understand what seems to be a second paradox: Does he believe that a professor during the time when Nixon and Kissinger were undermining a democratically elected government to support a brutal dictator could not/should not have explored the SEEJ consequences of this in a relevant course in higher education? In his response, perhaps he might share the fact that he was recently invited to a law school to discuss a topic related to differentials between male and female wages, an obvious social justice/equity issue, if ever there was one. If the school were somehow not allowed to engage this topic, or Walter not allowed to speak on it, would this not be a legitimate reason to invoke the concept of academic freedom? Are only law students to be afforded the right to consider important issues of social, economic, or ecological justice (SEEJ)? Finally, Walter says the vision statement is not to be taken seriously for any purpose; that they are all lies. How then would he explain why he feels they are in alignment with the “indoctrination” agendas that he thinks defines most universities? Surely, if faculty are doing that which the vision statement envisions for the sake of non-violence against women, gays, minorities, etc., then the vision statement cannot be entirely a lie. Also, since my co-author would likely believe that a private company should not present false advertising about its product (I am hoping that free enterprise does not encourage or tolerate such a practice), then why should not a university have the same right and responsibility to advertise what it is selling to its customers? And, apparently, if Walter feels both the vision statement and the university practices are left leaning, then they are obviously not false advertising, and everyone should have the academic freedom to support the public good. So is Walter’s argument that vision statements are lies or is it that because they are not lies what bothers him? So, if my illustrious collaborator could offer some comments that would help me understand his actual position (or at least tell me how he deals with the cognitive dissonance surrounding the apparent paradoxes), then we can move on to our next chapter where we examine whether or not there are things in the world that are best 26

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for the good of all when not privately owned, especially those environmental assets such as air, fresh water and oceans. Walter: I think that my distinguished colleague is beating a dead horse. After all, I did say, above, “…. I concede to Four Arrows, it (the vision statement) has some quasi contract aspects: the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) has successfully sued numerous institutions of higher learning for their trashing of the free speech rights of conservative students and professors on campus.” But, evidently, my co author is not satisfied with this concession of mine. So, let me further elaborate on it. FIRE has succeeded in forcing left wing administrations to back down in their trashing of the free speech rights of conservative and libertarian students and professors, in part, because of the failure of these universities to live up to claims appearing in their own vision statements guaranteeing precisely this sort of freedom of expression. For example, when students attempt to hold affirmative action bake sales, or show the bloody results of abortions, or try to engage in their second amendment rights to bear arms, or publicly post the Danish cartoons depicting Mohammed, or otherwise take advantage of free speech rights typically accorded to left wing students and faculty, the dean of the university typically forbids this, or confines it to small and specially designated “free speech zones” on the edge of campus (by the way, this furnishes further evidence that the university is a bastion of left wing sentiment). In cases of this sort, whether by letters to college presidents threatening lawsuits, or by initiating them, FIRE has been able to protect pro market students in the enjoyment of rights accorded to them by these mission statements. So, yes, I have been completely convinced by Four Arrows’ eloquent statements in behalf of vision statements. I retract my too critical remarks on them. I now see that they do indeed partake of contract like characteristics. Mea culpa. Uncle. I give up on this one. I certainly support Four Arrows’ eloquent call for reason in our “our mutual search for truth and understanding.” And, to be sure, an offer of “counter-evidence” is part and parcel of this process. I regard his rejection of Rothman, Nevitte, and Lichter (2005) on the ground that these authors were supported by right wing groups, and that their publication did not appear in “sufficiently scholarly” venues, as verging on the ad hominem fallacy. Stipulate that it is the case that money from these sources sustained this publication, it does not demonstrate by one whit that their research was flawed. I would have thought that it was a “settled” issue that faculties of major universities in the humanities and social sciences were wildly biased against the market place, and that even the professoriate of subject matters removed from public policy analysis (music, art, the hard sciences) was significantly predisposed in this direction. As for Four Arrows’ specific criticisms of Rothman, Nevitte, and Lichter (2005), I am very much less interested in the marginal changes that have taken place in the statistical evidence undergirding this conclusion, than I am in the fact that there is tremendous bias against economic freedom in both time periods. In the view of my esteemed co-author, “academic freedom should apply to everyone.” We are pretty far apart on this matter, in that it is my view that the 27

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default position ought to be that academic freedom should apply to no one. (However, this may be overridden if both parties, academic employer and employee, agree to override it.) Are all vision statements lies, every last word of them? Mary McCarthy famously said of Communist Lillian Hellman: “every word (she) writes is a lie, including ‘and’ and ‘the.’” No extremist I, I do not go that far in condemning most university mission statements. Sometimes, rarely, they show their true anti free enterprise venom, and on those occasions they are indeed, as Four Arrows insightfully insists, compatible with what actually goes on in the classroom, for the most part. As for changing our minds, a la Keynes, it would not bother me in the least if Four Arrows, after we have finished writing this book, converted to the libertarian freedom philosophy. Indeed, that is one of my motivations for engaging in this cooperative endeavour. It would be magnificent to have such an accomplished and eloquent scholar consistently take the side of liberty. But, I hope this change of heart and mind does not occur before we are finished, lest, we never complete the writing of this book. I hate to start projects and not bring them to a conclusion. I agree with Four Arrows that there is a problem with saying both that, one, politically correct vision statements are a complete lie, and, two, that universities push political correctness on campus in accord with them. This is indeed cognitive dissonance; my colleague is too polite to call it what it is: a downright logical contradiction. However, I maintain the truth of only the second of these claims, not the first. I doubt that there are any such mission announcements that are as brutally honest as the one I previously mentioned. Can he supply any such? As I stated above, the typical mission statement is not a lie in every word in every word of it (re McCarthy - Hellman). No, there are often mealy-mouthed sentiments expressed about equality, brotherhood, peace, good relations, social justice, etc., some of which are actually true; but they never quite get around to telling the whole truth, that the mainly left wing professoriate is intent upon inculcating our youth with the verities of “feminism, Marxism, anti white racism, the homosexual agenda, multiculturalism, social justice, Keynesianism, obscurantism and other varieties of political correctness.” Four Arrows wishes to call into question the research conducted by Rothman, Nevitte and Lichter (2005), buttressing the finding that the university is mainly the domain of leftists. He does so by recourse to N.C., S.S.M., & P.W. (2005). But there are problems here. First, this rejoinder appeared in Media Matters for America, self described as “a Web-based, not-for-profit, 501(c)(3) progressive research and information center dedicated to comprehensively monitoring, analyzing, and correcting conservative misinformation in the U.S. media.” In other words, it is not a scholarly organization with a peer reviewed double blind refereed journal; rather it is biased toward the left, in much the same as the Randolph Foundation, Americans for Tax Reform, the Independent Women’s Forum, and Center for the Study of Popular Culture are biased toward the right, and deprecated by Four Arrows on that ground. One wonders at this double standard. Further, at least Rothman, Nevitte and Lichter give us their full names, we thus know who we are dealing with when we read their works; the same cannot be said for “N.C., S.S.M., & P.W.” who vouchsafe us no such information. However, I regard these points merely as an exercise in ad 28

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hominem argumentation, unworthy of serious consideration. What matters is not who finances whom, or whether an essay appears in a blog, in a magazine, in a book, or in a scholarly journal. Nor does it matter one whit whether something is published on an anonymous basis. The only thing that, properly, counts, is the truth value of the claim. And here, it appears so far from the mark to deny that higher education in the U.S. is a virtually entirely owned subsidiary of the left, that all I can think of to do is to congratulate Four Arrows, and N.C., S.S.M., & P.W., for having the courage to defend so quixotic a position. Second, my co author waxes eloquent about N.C., S.S.M., & P.W. (2005). He neglects to mention that a rejoinder has been written to this critique (Rothman and Lichter, 2009). It would take me too far afield to discourse on the debate between these two sets of authors. Suffice it to say that in citing these two works (Rothman, Nevitte and Lichter, 2005; Rothman and Lichter, 2009) I have responded to Four Arrows’ request that we “offer counter-evidence to one another.” My collaborator asks why I feel a university “does not have the right to aspire toward its convictions.” I do not at all take this position. Very much to the contrary, if a private university were to articulate a vision statement about brain-washing students with politically correct goals, and stick to it, I maintain it would have every right to do so. I would not want to send my children there, nor do I think it would succeed in the marketplace of ideas, but that is entirely another matter. My indictment of these institutions of higher learning, to the contrary, is not that they honestly pursue this course of action (yes, libertarians do oppose fraud, among which false advertising is counted; Four Arrows’ hope “that free enterprise does not encourage or tolerate such a practice” is a well placed one), but rather engage in this practice in a surreptitious manner. For instance, if a college wants to highlight its opposition to “violence against homosexuals, women,” a goal I certainly support, there is nothing in the libertarian philosophy that would oppose it. And the same goes for discussing issues concerning Nixon and Kissinger and male and female wage differentials. However, let us suppose that Bob Jones University (BJU), or some other such institution of higher learning, prohibited discussion of these topics. Would this “not be a legitimate reason to invoke the concept of academic freedom,” asks Four Arrows. No it would not be, I reply. If BJU’s contract and/or vision statement proscribes such deliberations, or if Yeshiva University wishes to ban coverage of the Divinity of Christ, or if Brigham Young University desires that polygamy not be examined (I am making up these instances only for illustration purposes), then it would be improper for “academic freedom” to override these stipulations. I thought this would have been clear from Four Arrows’ new appreciation for the idea of universities “being somewhat like a business,” but one cannot have too much clarity about such issues. I did not at all “admit… that more liberal professors are taken to task in education worldwide, including imprisonment.” What I meant to say, no, what I did say, is that at times, in at least some nations, leftist professors have indeed suffered more indignities in many (non Communist-socialist) countries than those who advocate “free market corporatism.” It is not at all my view that leftish professors are brutalized to a greater degree than are rightist ones over the globe. Rather, fascist 29

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dictators do this, to be sure, but communists return the favor in the opposite direction. Yes, it would have indeed been difficult “to criticize Pinochet during his time in Chile”; but the same applies to promoting Adam Smith in East Germany or in the U.S.S.R. However, my main focus in this regard is not the rest of the world. When I insist that the professoriate mistreats conservative and libertarian faculty and students to a far greater degree than liberal ones (mainly by not hiring them in the first place, a point for which I am grateful to Four Arrows for forcing me to see), I have in mind mainly the U.S. and Canada, areas with which I have had some experience. I do not want to get into a debate about Pinochet vs. Allende while we are supposed to be discussing academic freedom. I would prefer to reserve such a dialogue for a chapter on foreign policy. But, since Four Arrows mentions the evils of the former and by implication the merits of the latter, it is only fair to note the case for the very opposite contention. See on this Stephens (2010) and McMaken (2005). Nor shall I respond, here, to Four Arrows’ points about violence against homosexuals and females, pay gaps between males and females, the warnings of ecological “science.” These are all fascinating topics, but deserve focused attention, which I intend to give them, along with I am sure my co author, in future chapters. I fear we are going to have to “agree to disagree” as to whether or not the campus (in the U.S. and Canada) is a totally owned subsidiary of the left. To me, the evidence is overwhelming. Four Arrows sees matters quite differently. I see no way to resolve this, given the attempts we have both made in this chapter. Ah, well, no one book, let alone any one chapter, can accomplish everything. Four Arrows: I hope the readers find this chapter as stimulating, challenging, interesting and ultimately enlightening as I. Although, it is obvious that we continue to articulate very differing views about academic freedom and its role in promoting in higher education, it seems that not only have we learned from one another, but we have become friends to some degree in the process, with the mutual respect that accompanies friendship. There have been some agreements and concessions that deserve mention. These may be useful in later dialogue about universities and social/ecological justice and sustainability agendas. For one, we now concur that vision statements, mission statements and employment contracts have some bearing on rights and responsibilities in higher education as relates to SEEJ. As the reader may recall, this has come from both of us having modified our original ideas as a result of the other’s arguments. It goes too far for Walter to assume that my willingness to take my position means I believe that universities should be run like businesses in all ways, a la the “free market,” but if aligning one’s work with a vision statement is a business concept, then I favor it. I also think we agree that professors of any political or ideological orientation who might stand against the hegemony of those in power are at risk if they teach their position to others. I hope that both of us will try harder to avoid the labels of left and right in future chapters, unless we can come to a mutually agreed-upon 30

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definition of these terms. When I claim that more teachers “on the left” are terminated, imprisoned or killed worldwide than those “on the right,” I am thinking of the main feature of the modern left that relates to social progressivism, whereas my co-author is likely thinking in economic or more classical terms. In any case, our over reliance on the assumptions concretized in ideological categories seems to be an obstacle in our dialogue that I hope we can surmount. This concern deserves an explanation, not just because of its importance in this chapter, but as it relates to this entire publication. Academic freedom, SEEJ and all the related topics we discuss in this book can be too easily supported in the shadow of ideological positions, rather than in light of reason, facts, or true history. For example, Walter used the infamous story about Yale returning twenty million dollars to support his argument that a university is a “totally owned subsidiary of the left.” On first glance at the history of this event via the many editorials from the left and right about it, it would be hard not to conclude that ideology played a role as Walter indicated. However, if a more in-depth and scholarly study of the event were undertaken, a much more complex explanation would emerge than it merely being a left-wing stance by faculty and administration against the teaching of Western civilization versus a more multicultural curriculum. Even Yale’s most vocal multiculturalists say they know of no organized lobbying effort to persuade Levin to block the course for ideological reasons and there is much evidence as to other factors for the rejection of the money (Kaylin, 1995). Another example of the problem of overly biased resources was my own reliance upon using Media Matters, a left-wing research organization, to challenge Walter’s use of right-wing authors. I did some further examination and found that this nonprofit organization uses researchers with undergraduate degrees in history and receives operating donations from individuals who are likely liberal. So I was, I supposed, guilty of a double standard as Walter alleged in relying on them to make my case. So what can the two of us do to avoid such traps? Walter alluded to one simple solution when he said that the Media Matters article was not peer reviewed. Certainly Walter and I, as university professors, can agree that any research we use to support our contentions should emanate from primary sources or from peer-reviewed publications. This will not make them fault proof, but it will help avoid the ideological emphasis found in less academic writings. Consider an example of how this common approach to scholarly disagreements will make a positive difference in our future cooperative arguments. Walter mentioned, though stating he prefers to debate the issue in a later chapter, that there are opposing positions to my earlier statement about the horrors of Pinochet. He offered a Wall Street Journal editorial by Bret Stephens as a citation. Stephens is a writer/editor for the Journal’s regular column, “Global Views.” The cited article claims that after the U.S.-backed coup in 1973 that seized power from the democratically elected president, Salvador Allende, a group of Chilean economists often referred to as “the Chicago boys,” instituted a series of radical free market reforms that ultimately led to building codes that protected Chilean citizens from sustaining more damage than they did during a major earthquake. 31

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Now, in this case, like my tendency to look at Media Matters to discern whether a claim is accurate or not, it is obvious that Walter’s libertarian worldview drew him to this particular article. However, we both would agree that academic freedom or not, a professor should not have the right to teach incorrect information. I think it is more likely this will happen to us, as with the Pinochet illustration, if we reference ideologically based, non-peer reviewed publications. I will do my best to minimize such sources in the future. Avoiding the ideology-based Wall Street Journal to rebut my mentioning the villainous exploits of Pinochet, by the way, seems a good example. Why? Because Chile’s modern seismic building code, drafted to resist earthquakes, was adopted in 1972, one year before Pinochet seized power in the bloody U.S-backed coup! This is one of those peer-reviewed facts where the ideology of the author was unlikely a factor. It is found in an article entitled, “Seismic Hazard and Countermeasures in Antofagasta-Chile,” published in Bulletin of the International Institute of Seismology and Earthquake Engineering. According to the article’s author, Tapia Cutierrez P., a professor in the Civil Engineering Department at Universidad Catolica del Norte in Antofagasta, Chile, “Construction is regulated however by several codes regarding both analysis and design. The Chilean Seismic Code is relatively old [3], its first version was approved in 1972 (1999, vol. 33, pp. 97–116).” (See the full abstract at: http://cat.inist.fr/?aModele=afficheN& cpsidt=1289347) As for Walter’s expressed desire to convert me to libertarianism, I ask that he replace this idea and instead merely continue our mutual efforts to convert one another’s thinking to that which is as reasonable and as true as we are able to determine. I am not trying to make an “Indian” of Walter, merely an honest man. Walter: I have but three minor points to make, and then, I think, we are finished with this chapter, the writing of which has been an exhilarating experience, after Four Arrows’ final whack at this piñata. My co author states: “we both would agree that academic freedom or not, a professor should not have the right to teach incorrect information.” I beg to differ. As far as I am concerned, a professor should indeed have such a right. For example, if I set up a mythical Blockhead University (my favorite university, I get to do exactly what I want, there) and announce we are going to teach things like 2+2=5, that triangles do not have 180 degrees, that water is composed of H3O, not H2O, I think I would have every right to do so. I would not be violating any libertarian law in so doing. Or, to take a more realistic example, in my view, Marxism, Keynesianism, feminism, neoclassical economics, are all vastly mistaken (the first three far more than the latter one). Professors who espouse such perspectives are thus “teaching incorrect information.” Would they, in the free society, be prevented from doing so? Of course not. Four Arrows mentions that he will do his “best to minimize” reliance on “ideologically based, non-peer reviewed publication … sources in the future.” Well, I shall not object to this course of action on his part. As for me, I shall take a different route. I fear I have a lot less faith in non ideologically based, peer reviewed publications than he. My friend “dislike(s) the labels, ‘right and left’ and ‘conservative and liberal’ and hope(s) we can do our best to avoid using them in the future.” Again, we will 32

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just have to agree to disagree on this matter. I respect his resolution on this ground, but, will not follow him down this path. These phrases are in my opinion good shorthand terms to account for much of what takes place in political economy, and I plan to avail myself of them. I thank Four Arrows from his comments on Chilean building codes. I think it would be better if we gave this important issue a far more in depth treatment than is appropriate under the rubric of “academic freedom,” to focus of the present chapter. And I will do so later on in this book. Four Arrows: Because Walter and I have agreed that if one author begins a chapter, the other gets to finish it, I have the luxury of the last word. First, I wish to briefly clarify my position on the “right” of a professor to teach “incorrect” information. I would (once again) agree with my colleague that a professor has a “right” to teach that 2+2 is 5. In terms of our chapter on academic freedom, and the legal and ethical parameters that surround it as I understand them, this “right” would be attached to the “right” of the professor’s employer to terminate him if such incorrect teaching was consistent and demonstrated through due process. I believe it was Samuel Johnson who wrote “every man has a right to utter what he thinks is truth, and every other man has a right to knock him down for it.” (I am here interpreting “knock him down” in the poetic sense: through evidence, reason and logic not fisticuffs). As for Walter’s lack of confidence in peer-reviewed papers, I can only agree that it is equally important to be critical of them as well as of an opinion piece. Nonetheless, I still have more confidence in primary source documentation to support a controversial position. I feel this kind of documentation is important when considering whether or not a professor should have the “academic freedom” to promote an idea. Finally, I am willing to utilize the “short-cut” language of left and right wing terms since Walter feels they are helpful. However, I feel that the great battles relating to academic freedom are at least partially a result of a dependence on affiliations with these “camps.” Douglas Ehringer wrote: “A definition of a liberal as a muddleheaded idealist who rejects time-honored values for the sake of remedying temporary social ills’ tells more about the prejudices of the person offering the definition than it does about the meaning of the term, ‘liberal’ (1974, p. 45).” When it comes to social and ecological justice, I feel that the “us versus them” ideological positions are the key to most academic freedom issues. Thus, even if we continue to use them, I hope we can avoid being trapped by them in our continuing dialogue. Because I believe so strongly that the ideological affiliations of people are basic to the problems inherent in academic freedom concerns (and likely in most of the rest of the book chapters), I end of this chapter with a relevant quote from my book, The Bum’s Rush: The Selling of Environmental Backlash (Phrases and Fallacies of Rush Limbaugh). The brand of government that opposes all radical elements ultimately leads to autocratic authority. This is something neither liberals nor conservatives want. Yet, it is the clash between the factions identify with each That sets stage for tyranny. The following is a brief description of how so-called liberals 33

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and conservatives mutually create the problem they both want to avoid. Assumptions assigned to each group swinging the pendulum of accusation from one extreme to the other until the momentum is too great to slow it down. It works something like this: Liberal: Man imagines heaven on earth that attempts to create various utopias. Conservative: This effort is radical. Perfection is not possible for man on earth. We are the is not so heavenly. The free enterprise offers the next best thing to happen-wealth. Liberal: The attainment of wealth is associated with suppression of individual rights of workers. Counter efforts include laws to restrain free enterprise. Conservative: The efforts to restrain free enterprise is associated with suppression of individual rights of entrepreneurs. Counter efforts include public criticism of lawmakers who are thought to be responsible. Liberal: People retaliate against the criticism of lawmakers by appealing to ideal values relating to global responsibility and individual dignity. Retaliation becomes more radical individualism degenerates into a responsible subjectivism. Conservative: Leaders convince masses of the futility of government efforts to achieve utopian ideals they focus on increasing social insecurity and frustration that result from social and political battles that exist. People become confused over issues of morality and choose sides. Militarism punishment and ethnocentrism than foster anarchy. Anarchy is the parent of Tierney. When people become confused and desperate they are more willing to follow and authoritarian personality. A banner of traditional values hides the arbitrary and despotic exercise of power of the new leader. People no longer try to determine what is propaganda and what is truth. The language of liberalism and conservatism thus causes people to forget we must work together to achieve goals that are not all that similar. This of course, is what we are trying to do in this book and hopefully it is the purpose of academic freedom in general (Jacobs, 1994, p. 64–65). It may also prevent us from truly understanding one another. In any case, I hope our opening chapter shows how both Walter and I are attempting to do what John Stewart Mill offers as important. He is talking about learning to know the perspective of someone with an opposing view: He must be able to hear them from persons who actually believe them; who defend them in earnest, and do their very utmost for them. He must know them in their most plausible and persuasive form; he must feel the whole force of the difficulty which the true view of the subject has to encounter and dispose of; else he will never really possess himself of the portion of truth which meets and removes that difficulty (1947/1859).

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Four Arrows’ Final Position: Although I initially believed that all education should employ academic freedom without restraint, I concede now that if a private school has a vision statement that specifically claims an agenda for the university that is contradicted by the teaching of a professor, that the professor’s academic freedom could be overridden by the university policy. Walter’s Final Position: Initially I saw academic freedom as a total farce and a folly. Now I understand that, on the condition of a vision statement or employment contract so stipulating, a professor should be allowed to discuss any topic he feels is supported by such a statement.

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ECOLOGICAL JUSTICE

Four Arrows’ Initial Position: I believe education should increase awareness about sustainability and unfair distribution of the consequences of unsustainable and polluting practices, especially those intentionally perpetrated for the sake of corporate profit. Walter’s Initial Position: Free market environmentalism is the last best hope for the planet, for mankind, and for liberty and justice. This philosophy is based on a strict reliance of the twin axioms of libertarianism: the non aggression axiom and private property rights. Four Arrows: Walter, you wrote in an online article entitled, “Saving Language,” that you favor environmental justice if it is predicated on private property rights and coupled with the libertarian axiom of nonaggression. Allow me to quote you further: Air pollution? It consists of trespassing smoke particles and can best be dealt with by upholding property rights. Species extinction? Privatize the elephants and rhinos. Loss of fish stocks? Privatize the oceans. That is environmental justice in my book, no matter what the other guys say (Block, 2006A) I ask you, How on earth (no pun intended) could the privatizing of such public or collective goods as air, forests, fresh water, and oceans be a good thing in light of the continuing history of corporate sponsored destruction of natural systems and resources? I realize that scholars have debated the “tragedy of the commons” for decades. I am learning that, sadly, virtually anything is susceptible to being controlled and losing its non-rival, non-excludable, and non-apportionable status. With overpopulation and wasteful practices being what they are, I can even see where, in some cases, private ownership can do a better job of protecting environments. Duck hunters’ private hunting reserves might be an example. However, these exceptions ultimately result from the scarcity that is largely produced by materialistic consumption and the profit motive that has encouraged it. The privatizing of air, water, rivers and oceans, however, is a frightening proposition since it seems to me that this state of affairs has largely been the cause of habitat destruction, global warming, and the loss of sustainable resources. Walter: Four arrows, I fear that you are conflating my own libertarian position (aka: anarchism, anarcho-capitalism, austro-libertarianism, capitalism, classical liberalism, free enterprise, laissez faire, laissez faire capitalism, right wing anarchism) with 37

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something very, very different: economic fascism (aka: conservatism, corporate state monopoly capitalism, corporatism, crony capitalism, kleptocracy, mercantilism, mixed economy, monopoly capitalism, neo-conservatism, neo-mercantalism, state capitalism, state monopoly corporate capitalism). For example, you inveigh against “corporate profit” and “the profit motive.” But, there is all the world of difference between corporations that earn profits by satisfying consumers in an honest manner (McDonalds, Microsoft, Wal-Mart, the corner shoe store, the neighbourhood pub, the local book seller), and those that are in bed with the ruling class and are part and parcel of the U.S. government’s drive for world domination through imperialism (Archer-Daniels-Midland, Bechtel, Blackwater, Boeing, Diebold, General Electric, General (Government) Motors, Halliburton, Litton, Lockheed-Martin, Monsanto, Northrop-Grumman, Pitney-Bowes, Raytheon, Varian). Money earned by the former set of companies is paid directly to them from willing customers on a voluntary basis; not so for most of the profits deposited in the coffers of the latter; they are, to a significant degree, based on monies forcibly collected from unwilling taxpayers. The market based firms and their profits are compatible with justice, not those embodying corporate state monopoly capitalism. I must also part company with you in your condemnation of “materialistic consumption.” I don’t fully know your personal financial situation, but I am willing to bet that you own a house, a car, a television set, more than one or two pair of shoes, socks, shirts, etc. I do know that you play handball, and thus have a few pair of sneakers, handball gloves, sweat bands, handballs; I also know that you have access to a computer. We have been communicating via this product for this last little while. How do you defend yourself against the charge of “materialistic consumption?” Nor do I agree with you, at least at the outset (I am open to conversion on this or any other point) that “scarcity … is largely produced by materialistic consumption and the profit motive.” As I see matters, scarcity has nothing at all to do with either of those two phenomena. Scarcity is defined as wanting more material wealth than we already have. There will always be scarcity as long as there are human beings. Right now, right off the top of my head, I would like a cure for cancer, for AIDS, for heart disease, for mental illness, indeed, for all such debilitations. I would like no one on earth to be poor. I would like to enjoy interplanetary space travel; hey, while I’m at it, I would like us to be able to avail ourselves of trips to other solar systems, too. And, none of this 1000 years to get anywhere either. I want it to be instantaneous. All of this is presently beyond our wealth capacities; all of these failures of the human race can be put down to scarcity. Scarcity has nothing to do with “materialistic consumption.” Were we a species of Ghandis, we still would not be able to attain my goals set forth above, at present. Nor is this failure on our part due to the “profit motive.” This was pretty much banished in the now happily long ago USSR, and still remains so in economic backwaters such as Cuba and North Korea, who are far further removed from banishing scarcity than is the semi capitalist west. There are two ways to end scarcity: get an Aladdin’s Lamp that grants our every wish, or, become ascetics. But even Ghandi couldn’t act in the absence of scarcity: he used a diaper, goat’s milk, cow urine, flip flops on his feet, 38

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medicine (for himself; he wouldn’t allow this for his wife), etc. Then, there was that slight matter of ending British imperialism in India, something that would take great wealth and power. No ascetic, he. Four Arrows, you mention air, forests, fresh water, oceans, over-population, wasteful practices and species extinction (ducks). That is as good a list as any with which to begin this chapter (I would like to add global warming, the ozone layer, running out of resources such as oil, recycling, the plastic bogeyman; I doubt you would disagree that these, also, are grist for our mill), and I am grateful to you for lining up these topics in that manner. Let me respond to you on these points in that order. AIR

In the period 1830–1840, there were a spate of nuisance lawsuits (we would now call them environmental cases) in the U.S. (Rothbard, 1982; Horwitz, 1977). Typically, a little old lady would come into court, spluttering, “That there factory engaged in aggression against my property rights. When I hung out my laundry, it was clean and wet. When I return to my clothesline a few hours later, it was dry, but dirty.” The plaintiff would demand two things: damages for the costs imposed on her in re cleaning her washing, and an injunction, forbidding the business firm from continuing its trespass of smoke particles onto her laundry. Or, a farmer would complain that the railroad emitted sparks that burned his crops. He, too, pleaded for damages and an injunction. Or, someone would complain that crop dusting, or residential smokestacks, or some other source of pollution was violating his property rights, and come to court for similar relief. It is not true to say that these victims of this pollution always prevailed in their lawsuits. Sometimes, in these early days, they were thrown out of court. But, often, they were upheld, and the smoke particle or spark trespassers were forced to cease and desist. This had several salutary effects. At one fell swoop, the entire externalities or market failure argument was undermined. It was obvious, in that far off time, that the market had not “failed.” Rather, it was working just fine, albeit never perfectly, as no institution known to man ever does. For example, the polluters were led by Adam Smith’s “invisible hand,” to substitute clean burning, but more expensive anthracite coal for the cheaper and dirty burning sulphur coal previously in use. This meant that the so called “externality” was internalized. These trespassers were now taking the costs they imposed on others into account. There were also some research and development attempts to reduce pollution of any type or variety by use of screens in smokestacks to catch the runaway particles before they seeped out onto other people’s property, and spark catchers on railroad engines. Locational decisions were also affected. New factories would tend to be set up where they would do the least damage to others, the better to avoid lawsuits. Further, there are almost always different ways to skin the proverbial cat: one can engage in pollution intensive, or non intensive, modalities. In this early era, the latter would naturally predominate. Given that the pollution problem was not perfectly solved, there were always de minimum issues abounding, at least it was being dealt with in a rational manner. 39

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But then came the “Progressive” period of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. A new philosophy permeated the American judiciary. At the time Great Britain was the world’s greatest power. The U.S. sought to become the leading imperialist. How could this be accomplished? By allowing little old ladies, farmers, and other whiners to be a burr under the saddle of munitions makers, steel producers, railroads and other heavy industries? Of course not. So during this period and afterward, environmental plaintiffs were in effect told by judges under this new legal philosophy, “Sure, your private property rights are being violated; your silly, anti social, snivelling, greedy, private property rights, that is. But there is something more important than them: the public good! (drum roll, please). Under this new dispensation, the court argued, the public good must now support basic manufacturing, so that battleships, munitions, tanks, etc., can be cheaply produced; thus, society cannot afford to uphold private property rights that are inconsistent with this goal, as it has done in the past. And, such cases, which were taken seriously in the early epoch, were now summarily dismissed. States Rothbard (1982): In the classic case of Holman v. Athens Empire Laundry Co. (1919), the Supreme Court of Georgia declared: “The pollution of the air, so far as reasonably necessary to the enjoyment of life and indispensable to the progress of society, is not actionable.” Well, if pollution is not “actionable,” why ever would a manufacturer cease and desist from violating the property rights of environmental victims? Consider the position of a libertarian, or “green” railroad, or factory. On the one hand, it would not want to pollute others. But, on the other hand, if it refrained from shifting some of its costs onto others, it would be at a competitive disadvantage vis a vis other members of its industry. It would either tend to go bankrupt, or bend to this new legal wind, and violate the private property rights of others. So, no more anthracite coal (which was mainly produced in western states, such as Colorado and Wyoming). Sulphur coal (produced in West Virginia, Pennsylvania, Ohio and other states with more political pull – note the crony capitalism at work here) was back in style (Kolko, 1963). Research and development, and the placement of pollution intensive manufacturing would now be located without any consideration of lungs or clean laundry. Profits could now be maximized by employing pollution intensive means of production. The courts did, however, offer a sop to the plaintiffs during this era: minimum smokestack heights were imposed. But this only swept the problem under the rug, or, rather, into the clouds. Hello, acid rain. When, in the 1960s and thereafter, it was finally realized that pollution was a problem, did the state apparatus go back to the relatively libertarian legal system of the early 19th century? To ask this is to answer it: of course not. This would have meant “turning the clock backwards.” We are all progressives, now. Not for us such an antiquarian system. Instead, after first itself creating the crisis by denigrating private property rights, it added on yet other layers of government intervention, the so called “Clean Air Act,” etc. As can be readily appreciated, this was not laissez faire capitalism in operation. Rather, it was the triumph of monopoly state corporate capitalism. Four Arrows, in 40

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one sense we agree: this debacle was indeed due to “corporate sponsored destruction of natural systems.” But, this stemmed not from anything even remotely related to laissez faire capitalism, with its respect, nay, worship of private property rights. Rather, it was due to economic fascism. FORESTS

Why would the privatization of forests help promote environmental goals? Simple. When forest land is in private hands, if the owner makes wise decisions with regard to his property, he can earn honest profits. And, with them, he can expand the base of his operations. If on the contrary, he errs, whether with regard to planting, or harvesting, or controlled fire burns, or chain cutting trees, or replanting, or with his decision to build a logging road or not, what kind of capital and labor to employ, what type of tree to plant, monoculture or diversity of tree species, whether to encourage animal life, etc., then he will make losses (the other part of the profit and loss system, where each part is of equal importance). If so, he will not be able to purchase more land. Rather, he will have to cut back on his operations. If he does not learn from his mistakes and improve efficiency, he will eventually be forced into bankruptcy (always assuming no corporate capitalist “too big to fail” bailouts). This constitutes an automatic feedback mechanism. If efficient operators are continually being rewarded for productivity, and satisfying customers, and inefficient ones penalized, the overall state of the industry will be one of prosperity and growth. Here is a list of very large companies that now lie on the dustbin of business history. None of them are from the forestry industry, but all make the general point in favour of profits and losses, of the beneficial effects on the entire economy of bankruptcy (Ross, n.d., Salomon, 2009): AIG, American Motors, Braniff, Circuit City, CIT, Conseco, De Soto, Eastman Kodak, Enron Corp., FCOA, IndyMac, Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc., Linens ‘n Things, Nash, National Sugar Refining, Pacific Gas & Electric Co., Packard, Pan Am, Refco Inc, Ritz Camera, Studebaker, Texaco, Trans World Airlines, United Shoe Machinery Company, Washington Mutual and WorldCom Inc.1 And this is to say nothing of the thousands of blacksmiths, horse trainers, horseshoe, saddle and whip manufacturers positively trashed by the onset of Ford and other horseless carriage firms. According to one commentator (Perry, 2010): Comparing the Fortune 500 in 1959 to 2009, I find that there are only 72 companies that appear in both lists. In other words, only 14% of the Fortune 500 companies in 1959 were still on the list fifty years later in 2009, and 86% of the companies have either gone bankrupt, merged, gone private, or still exist but have fallen from the top 500 companies (ranked by gross revenue). That’s a lot of churning and creative destruction, and it’s probably safe to say that many of today’s Fortune 500 like the ones listed above will be replaced by new companies in new industries by the year 2059. In sharp contrast, in very sharp contrast, if the forests are in the hands of the government, for example under the tender mercies of the Bureau of Land Management 41

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(BLM), then this automatic feedback mechanism is almost completely stifled. When the BLM errs, and, being human, they always do, they are not automatically penalized financially. Au contraire, the very opposite often occurs. More and more money is shovelled down their selfish maws. A case in point: are controlled burns economical? Do they preserve resources? Promote ecological considerations? I am not a biologist; I am not sure. However, as an economist I know this: if they are viable, then those private owners who allow or encourage them will prosper; if not, not. Whereas, there is no such guarantee that applies to the BLM. The U.S. Post Office has lost zillions of dollars; have they gone the way of these now extinct private businesses? I’ll give you one guess. One last example; since its inception, the Fed has presided over the loss of 95% of the value of the dollar it presumably has a mandate to protect. Have they gone the way of the dodo bird? Not at all. How about on the rare occasions when a public entity makes a correct decision; is their budget automatically increased? Of course not. There are other reasons why privatization is to be preferred to public ownership, and this holds true whether the firms are environmentally related or involve other industries. Mises (1922) makes the point that if industry is in government hands, there can be no private capital markets, and without them rational economic planning is impossible. Hayek (1937) demonstrates that a price system, emanating from private markets, is necessary for the spread of information throughout the economy. FRESH WATER

There is “water, water, water, everywhere, and not a drop to drink” at least that is healthy, in all too many cases of government provision. One case in point is the issue of breast milk substitutes put out by firms such as Nestle. This corporation has been heavily criticized for increasing infant mortality (Nestle, n.d., Begley, 2002), but the real problem is the poor condition of the water mixed with this baby formula, and, of course, it is the governments in less well developed countries that are the monopoly suppliers of H2O. I make this point not to defend everything the Nestle corporation has ever done; merely to spotlight the problems with statist water in underdeveloped nations. The public sectors of the developed countries do fare a bit better than that in providing water, but that is not saying much at all. Perhaps the greatest indictment of statist water supply is the advent of bottled water. Here we have a situation where the government gives away a good absolutely for free, and a significant portion of consumers spurn it, in favour of the greater reliability of the private sector alternative, which comes to them at a not insignificant cost. There can hardly be greater evidence of the relative efficacy of these two very different sources of supply. And what is the government’s reaction to consumers spurning its free product, and embracing the costly private alternative? It is, of course, to ban its competition (Breaking News, 2008; Cho, 2006, Olson, 1999). When government disburses commercial levels of water for a fee, its pricing policy is misallocative. For example, it charges a very high price per acre foot to city dwellers, while heavily subsidizing farmers (Anderson, 1998; Anderson, and 42

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Snyder, 1997; Reyburn, 1992; Sutter, 2010; Whitehead, Gould and Block, 2004; Whitehead and Block, 2002), and does not allow a private water market to overcome this inefficiency. This in effect wastes water, since it cannot “flow” to the users who value it most highly. Suppose apples were selling for $5 per crate in Santa Barbara, and $200 for this amount in New Orleans. The supply of this fruit would be too high in the former city, and too low in the latter. Arbitrageurs would soon enough purchase the apples at low prices in California, and ship them to Louisiana, thereby earning a profit, of course, and creating economic wealth by ironing out this misallocation. But this is not allowed in the case of water, which, in effect, destroys a significant amount of the economic value of this substance for society. Then there are international governmental water policies that lead to wrack and ruin. For example, Canada, which is literally up to its armpits in this fluid, refuses to allow sales to parched parts of its southern neighbour (Lendman, 2010). There are even Americans who counsel Canada not to sell water in bulk to the U.S. (Howatt, 2008). This northern nation’s population comprises a mere one half of one percent of the world’s total (it has about as many people as does California). And yet it contains about 20% of the entire planet’s fresh water supply. Because of political correctness, it prohibits bulk sales of this commodity, insisting that any exports be limited to containers containing no more than about 8 gallons. “Progressive” forces utterly despise “commodificiation,” that is, allowing markets to prevail (Anderson and Barnett, 1999; Barnett, 1988; Block, 1999), in several fields other than water. This, perhaps, accounts for Canada’s refusal to allow bulk water exports. No, no, no, society would be far better off if there was a separation of state and fresh water, just as in the case of state and religion, state and education, for that matter, state and just about anything else you could mention. OCEANS

The oceans, seas, rivers and lakes are not pulling their full economic weight (Anderson, 1983; Anderson, and Snyder, 1997; Block, 1992, 2001A, 2001B; Hannesson, 2004, 2006; Motichek, Block and Johnson, 2008; Rothbard, 1955, 1956A, 1956B, 1985, 2007; Sutter, 2010; Tucker, 2008; Whitehead and Block, 2002; Whitehead, Gould and Block, 2004). They are the backwaters of commercial development. This is due, not to anything intrinsic about them, but, rather, to the fact that they are in a state of non ownership, or government ownership, each one worse than the other. Property rights merely delineate who has a right to work with which resources. In their absence, matters are unclear. But without unambiguous assignment of tasks and responsibilities, we cannot cooperate with one another as well as when there is such specificity. One example of this is overfishing. Since no one owns the fishing rights in the oceans, a resource that could be greatly contributing to human welfare is instead on the verge of dissipation. Due to the tragedy of the commons involved, the incentive of a fisherman to preserve some stocks for a later day is greatly atrophied. If he does, someone else may come along to take advantage of the seed corn of the sea that he spurned. The results of this phenomenon were dramatically illustrated in the 43

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case of the whale, with the movie “Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home.” There, an alien super race threatens us humans; they are upset that we have hunted the whales to extinction. But, this is economically advantageous under present institutional arrangements. Why should any given whaling ship not harpoon one of these creatures? If it refrains, it is unlikely in the extreme that it will ever get another chance at that particular mammal. However, if the ocean were owned, property rights in whales would be clear. If anyone else harvested my whale, this would then constitute a crime similar to cattle rustling. Similar problems beset other aspects of the ocean. It is unclear as to who is the owner of below surface oil deposits, and manganese nodules resting on the ocean floor. At present, surface paths for boats still are not scarce, but, if governments stop creating economic depressions and we once again experience growth in real GDP, traffic will undoubtedly increase. Who will set up the rules of the “road,” on the surface of our seas? The libertarian answer is clear: the water which covers some 75% of our earth’s surface should be treated in much the same manner as the land. Ownership should be based on homesteading, with free markets in the purchase and sale to follow. The same analysis applies to lakes. Should they be used for boating, or fishing, or swimming? Or, perhaps as a garbage dump? Maybe as a source of drinking water? The only rational solution to these problems of alternative uses is private property, the price system, and the profit motive. This is precisely why countries that follow such a rationale on the land prosper, and enjoy economic development. Should a given bit of land be used for residences, shops, a hotel, an office building? The market decides such questions, automatically, without fuss or fanfare. Were this system adopted for lakes, similar benefits would ensue: there would tend to be a congruence between consumer desires and actualities. And, ditto for rivers, the Army Corp of Engineers and FEMA, between them, managed to kill off some 1,500 people in the New Orleans area (Block, 2006, Block and Rockwell, 2007). Are these entities still at the same old lemonade stand, “selling” their wares to the unwary? Of course they are. It would appear that the Army Corp of Engineers is incapable of building levies that can withstand hurricanes, their assurances and braggadocio to the contrary notwithstanding (Fausset, 2009; Hoar, 2006). Were these organization private, they would have joined the ranks of other bankrupt firms. They governmental status ensures that they still operate. OVER-POPULATION

There is no over population problem (Bauer, 1981; Block, 2009; Friedman, 1972; Simon, 1990, 1996; Sowell, tba) advocates to the contrary (Ehrlich, 1968) notwithstanding. According to the views of latter day Malthusians, it is a race between population growth, and the carrying capacity of the earth to accommodate ever larger and larger numbers of people. Eventually, we will run out of food, resources, and even space on which to place these hordes; we will become poorer and poorer, and large number of us will die of starvation. If this were true, we should see, even nowadays (in 1968 Ehrlich predicted this doomsday occurrence would unfold in 44

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the 1980s), a negative correlation between wealth and population density. In other words, the more a given locale resembles this horror scenario (that is, high population density), the poorer it would be. But the facts simply do not bear this out. Yes, there are poor high dense places (cities in India) and rich areas with little population (the American west), but there are also very wealthy metropolises with gigantic populations per square mile (Manhattan, San Francisco) and impoverished ones with very few people in them (large parts of Africa). There is simply no statistically significant correlation between the two. The best explanation of poverty, world wide, is not population density, but rather economic freedom (Gwartney, Lawson and Block, 1996) and intelligence (Lynn, and Vanhanen, 2002, 2006). States Richman (1995) “Between 1776 and 1975, while the world’s population increased sixfold, real gross world product rose about 80-fold.” The naked eye, at least given the bird’s eye view afforded by airplane travel, casts doubt on the overpopulation thesis. Cast your eyes down west of the Mississippi at night, and hardly ever a pin prick of light will you ever see. This is true, albeit less so, east of this river. With the exception of the Boston – DC corridor, the eastern half of the U.S. looks as if it is empty, too. To put this in even more stark terms, consider the following. Suppose the entire population of the globe were housed in typical middle class family homes of about 2500 square feet on two levels, with small front and back yards. There would be nothing else in this scenario: no shops, no roads, no farms, no nothing else. What land mass would be required to house all six plus billion of us? Answer: Texas. Here is one more dramatic way of undermining the overpopulationist hysteria. Suppose the world’s population tried to stuff themselves into a phone booth. Each of us would be allotted an amount of cubic space necessary for the average person: about 5’8” in height, about 10 inches in depth, and about two feet in width. What would be the dimensions of a box necessary to hold us all? One cubic mile! The earth is empty, and will remain so for a long time to come. What will happen then, in several centuries, when we reach, say, 100 billion? Why, space travel, colonization of at least the Moon and Mars, assuming we have not blown ourselves up before then. One last critique of over populationism. It is logically impossible for anyone to even articulate such a philosophy; it would constitute a performative contradiction. For suppose someone, a Malthusian, says, “There are too many people on the earth, and I think this a bad thing.” The obvious rejoinder to him is, “Well, if you are so worried about this, why don’t you commit suicide? You have it within your power to reduce the size of the population by one. By your very utterance, you have proven you don’t take your own views seriously; otherwise you would be dead. If you are not serious about this, why should anyone think you are in earnest about it?” SPECIES EXTINCTION

It occurs to me, Four Arrows, that on this issue we might not be too far apart. Your statement: “Duck hunters’ private hunting reserves might be an example… (where) … private ownership can do a better job of protecting environments,” is certainly compatible with the way that free market environmentalists look at the matter. If only this message could get out to people of your persuasion, there might be less 45

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intellectual strife between our two camps. In order to promote this end, I shall elaborate on how private property can save endangered species. The most dramatic example of this phenomenon involves the comparison of the cow and the buffalo. Although in many ways these are similar animals, the former was always owned privately, not the latter. No farmer goes into his “lower 40” and machine guns all his cows. To do so would be extremely expensive. The cost of a cow slaughtered today is the absence of that bovine tomorrow. Matters are very different with the buffalo, which were running free for decades. In that case, the cost of killing one of this species was very low; approximately zero. You couldn’t “save” this particular one for tomorrow, as you could, a cow. It was the absence of private property rights in the one case, that led to the wholesale and indiscriminate slaughter of one of these animals. This fate was spared the other, due to the presence of private property rights, and thus their owners had a strong profit making incentive to preserve and protect them. As far as I am concerned, this lesson applies, fully, to the elephant, the rhino, and other at risk species in Africa. Barnyardization, and only barnyardization, will save them. Yes, the barnyards will have to be a bit bigger; ok, quite a bit bigger. And the fences stronger. But the principle is the same: if the elephant and rhino are privately owned, they will be cared for. Never in a million years would an owner allow a pregnant rhino to be shot (except for very, very big bucks paid by a hunter, a la your duck hunter case.) Whereas, with “public” ownership, or non ownership, the poachers have no such preservation incentive (Simmons and Kreuter, 1989). They often kill for the tusks alone, leaving the valuable skin and meat to rot in the jungle. Their time horizon will be limited to the next few hours; the fact that their actions, when replicated, will spell the death knell for the entire species matters to them not at all. What should educators teach about the environment? Anything they damn well please as far as I am concerned. It is still a (semi) free country, and professors should feel free to uphold whatever hypotheses they wish (assuming no contractual obligations to the contrary). However, if they want to tell the truth, they must embrace free market environmentalism. Four Arrows: As I contemplate the reasons for your ideas, assumptions and statements in this chapter, I can imagine them fitting into one of five possibilities. You are: – An alien from another planet – A religious fundamentalist whose view of reality is blinded by the gospel of his religion, in this case, free market libertarianism, or what have you – A “white man” who will say or rationalize anything to make way for the almighty dollar – A highly intelligent, good-hearted soul whose education has not yet allowed for learning a number of vital truths about history – Someone with a perspective that must have enough grains of truth in it to make it important for me to understand them even though they make little sense to me now 46

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I continue to operate in accordance with the last two options, but offer the first three to emphasize how truly puzzled, even mortified I am, at least initially, by your comments. Because I genuinely want to understand what I obviously do not, I want to select a few of your comments and, rather than countering the veracity with counter-evidence and scholarly citations, I want to briefly offer my counter thinking in general. Within this context I ask you to explain where I am missing the boat in your estimation. If you do not accept my example and need a citation, just let me know and I’ll comply. If you accept the fact of my example, however, then please explain how your position holds water in light of it or, how you might modify your description of it so I can better understand. I will sub-topic each idea for clarity. POLLUTION

Walter, you seem to argue that prior to government regulation of environmental pollution, laissez faire capitalism worked reasonably well on its own to reduce pollution. You also quote a 1919 law to conclude that air pollution is not “actionable” and that somehow this proves that other motivations, presumably free market demand and supply laws, motivate manufactures to “cease and desist from violating the property rights of environmental victims.” Am I understanding you correctly? And if so, how can your assertion be so totally incorrect in terms of even a cursory glance at history? And why would the existence today of regulatory laws like the Clean Air Act cause corporations to pollute? This makes no sense at all. For every incident you can show me, and I doubt you will be able to show me many, where a business curtailed or prevented pollution on its own, without pressure from the public or from laws, and I will cite fifty where it required such pressure. Furthermore, you are wrong that air pollution is not actionable as a number of court decisions all the way up to the recent Ohio decision make air pollution illegal (Hunt, 2010). Although, sadly, common law remains weak in this arena, it certainly does not still hinge on the 1919 case you cited (Morag-Levine, 2003). In fact, it seems that many if not all of your arguments in this section can be challenged with a correct understanding of history. I will get to Gandhi, materialism, scarcity, barnyardization and the killing of buffalo with similar historical snippets. For now, tell me how the following shows that the problems you describe as resulting from the “progressive era” did not exist previously? I conveniently quote just a few incidents from Kovarik’s “Environmental History Timeline” (2008) which is available online. Please read them to gain the perspective I’m asking you to see historically. 1700 – Some 600 ships are engaged in hauling “sea coal” from Newcastle to London, an enormous increase compared to 1650, when only two ships regularly carried sea coal. The reason? Rapid industrialization and the demand for iron and naval supplies has stripped England’s forests. 1706 – Benjamin Franklin born January 17 in Boston, Mass. Franklin’s concern for sanitation and pure drinking water was a part of his lifelong concern for 47

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the improvement of Philadelphia in “small matters.” But Franklin also saw a larger question – one of “public rights” as opposed to private rights – in many of these controversies. 1739 – Benjamin Franklin and neighbors petition Pennsylvania Assembly to stop waste dumping and remove tanneries from Philadelphia’s commercial district. Foul smell, lower property values, disease and interference with fire fighting are cited. The industries complain that their rights are being violated, but Franklin argues for “public rights.” Franklin and the environmentalists win a symbolic battle but the dumping goes on. 1778 – India – Belief in protection of the animal and plant kingdom reached its apotheosis in 1778 when 294 men and 69 women laid down their lives to protect the khejri tree. 1834 – London officials bring nuisance charges against a coal - gas manufacturing firm that contaminated the Thames by releasing large amounts of coal tar from the plant. Although other indictments had been brought, Rex v. Medley was apparently the first to have been successfully prosecuted. “Defendants unlawfully and injuriously conveyed great quantities of filthy, noxious, unwholesome and deleterious liquids, matters, scum and refuse into the river Thames, whereby the waters became charged and impregnated with the said liquid and became corrupted and insalubrious and unfit for the use of his Majesty’s subjects. People who supported themselves and their families by catching and selling fish were deprived of their employment and reduced to great poverty and distress.” 1853 – Novelist Charles Dickens opens his novel Bleak House with an image of London as a twisted, twilight world of smoke, shadows and wraiths. Dickens writes: “Smoke lowering down from chimney-pots, making a soft black drizzle, with flakes of soot in it as big as full-grown snow flakes – gone into mourning, one might imagine, for the death of the sun.” 1860 – Promoting solar energy, Prof. Augustine Mouchot of Lycee de Tours, France, said: “One cannot help coming to the conclusion that it would be prudent and wise not to fall asleep regarding this quasi security. Eventually industry will no longer find in Europe the resources to satisfy its prodigious expansion Coal will undoubtedly be used up. What will industry do then?” 1863 – Air pollution from British chemical industry spurs the Alkali Act, intended to create reductions in hydrogen chloride emissions during alkali production. It allows agents of the first British pollution control agency, the Alkali inspectorate, to question industry officials and suggest improvements; but there were no actual regulations concerning amounts of air pollution until the act was revised in 1906. 1870 – Jan. 10 – John D. Rockefeller incorporates the Standard Oil Company. Predatory business practices help it to monopolize the oil industry.1870 – First

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coal mine safety laws passed in Pennsylvania following a fire that suffocated 179 men. 1871 – U.S. Fish Commission formed to study decline of coastal fisheries. A WORLD OF DIFFERENCE?

You say “there is world of difference between corporations that earn profits by satisfying consumers in an honest manner” like McDonalds and Wal-Mart and the local book seller in contrast with those like Halliburton, Monsanto or G.E. that are somehow in cahoots with the federal government. You say that we taxpayers unwillingly pay money to the latter and the former are compatible with SEEJ. Walter, I fear you are drawing a very thin line, too thin. For example, Wal-Mart has significant ties to the government and its politics. It donates millions of dollars to political candidates and spends millions more are more than a dozen inside the beltway lobbyist and outside federal lobbying firms. It refuses to carry books supporting views that oppose the political party it supports with its money. For example, it refused to carry the best selling book, America (The Book): A Citizen’s Guide to Democracy In-Action in 2004 as well as banning Robert Greenwalds’s documentary Uncovered: The Whole Truth About the Iraq War. It has its own Federal Government Relations Department in Washington, D.C. As for its “honest” services, Walter, please don’t make me or the readers go through a long list of researched items revealing Wal-Mart’s dishonest policies as relates to everything from its “green” ecological footprint to its employee relations history. I am simply making the point that the difference between the two groups or styles of capitalism are not all that different. Don’t get me wrong, we can find some “good corporations,” but they are not the rule in terms of the global problems we are facing. Had you selected Wal-Mart’s competitor, Costco, by the way, I would have noted some serious reasons why Costco is better, like no PR firm, a CEO willing to earn less than a million a year, etc. But again, this would illustrate a rarity among corporations or corporate goals. Oh, you did name a “corner book seller.” I was wondering if it was one of those that Wal-Mart put out of business! Then you include McDonald’s as another good capitalism model. Yeah, now there is an honest company with a great environmental track record. I’ve just looked at the history of its law suits and settlements. You don’t want to go there. And although I did not spend much time on its government cronyism, a brief check on Google revealed official Italian government endorsement and partnerships with McDonalds (MSNBC, Feb 2, 2010). Then there is Nestles, a company you cautiously put forward. Here you have chosen another example of a corporation with a profit motive on the “good guy side” that does good for our environment. I suggest our readers do some primary source research about this company’s unethical marketing practices that encourage mothers to use unhealthy water and mix with the product; their exploitation of farms and promotion of genetically modified foods that can wreak havoc with biological diversity; the illegal extraction of groundwater (they just lost a suit in Michigan on this matter (Leonard, 2009); fraudulent labeling; pollution, etc. Nestle Sources 49

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Shanghai Ltd’s bottled water manufacturing plant also made the list for starting operation before its wastewater treatment facilities had passed an environmental impact assessment. Nestlé has taken water from numerous U.S. communities on the cheap or for nothing at all, bottled and sold it — for billions of dollars in profit — and then dumped the environmental and other costs onto society. And this relates only to one of their many enterprises. It does not even speak to one of the worst growing environmental problems facing us, that of plastic debris in our oceans (such as Nestle water bottles). I’m hoping, Walter, that you are aware of the North Pacific Gyre’s plastic garbage patch and the four others like it around the world and the current science projects surrounding possibilities for consequences that are dire for all of us. All I am saying is that too many corporations have emerged in the world that focus on the quarterly profit report to the exclusion of any authentic concern for what their product does to the environment. I could write an entire book on this topic alone. So, Walter, I just want you to tell me if you believe your ideas about free market capitalism are widespread and have been historically. How many firms do you honestly feel have emphasized social and ecological justice for workers, the public and the environment? If you agree they are few and far between, or even that there may be many but the larger ones you list are on the bad side of things, then maybe we are both yearning for a similar ideal that does not exist Maybe there is a reason that when most small corporations get big, they turn sociopathic that we need to understand. If it relates partially to problem Eisenhower pointed about the military-industrial complex let’s get higher education to study it. Maybe there is a reason that throughout history, corporations or large businesses worldwide have done violence to others with their business practices. Since you and I agree that doing such violence is a social or ecological injustice that colleges and universities should address, we should agree that this is a vital topic for universities. However, your simple statement that free enterprise is the only solution does not stand the test of history. BUFFALOS AND BARNYARDS

Walter, saying that the killing off of the buffalo happened because there was no “cost” factor reveals one of my criticisms of all types of capitalism- that they place monetary considerations ahead of all others. The idea that “costs” only relate to monetary considerations is vulgar to me. To suggest that there was no cost to the slaughter of the buffalo apart from monetary ones ignores the very great “cost” to the “Indians.” It disregards the intentional policy of the U.S. government to destroy the Indian way of life and compel them to adopt the habits of civilization. And yes, this also relates to the state/private industry partnerships that it seems we both do not like. The government provided free ammunition for people to kill the animals as a matter of anti-Indian policy and a continuation of the 1830 Indian Removal Act (American University, n.d.). President Grant even vetoed a bill in 1875 to protect buffalo or any other wildlife. Would you call this the opposite of federal regulation? Or is this an example of crony capitalism? In your view is government is the enemy 50

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of capitalism or the friend? And how does your answer square with historical facts, not white-washed stories of conquest? Your idea about putting all creatures into some sort of zoo as a way to save them also seems to devalue that which cannot be directly tied to money and the unfettered, unregulated pursuit of it. History again shows that the decimation of species originated by business and industry making room for themselves at the expense of the flora and fauna. Game preserves were not set up, except as relates to a few private hunter clubs I referred to earlier. This was done not by private industry, but by public entities. That is what has prevented total extinction of some species and have allowed them to roam in their natural habitat as opposed to zoos or “barnyards.” You speak of illegal poaching on game preserves, but have you considered that that game preserves are what have saved a number of animals from extinction? Poaching by those who would selling their products on the “free market” (is a black market free?) would and does occur on private properties as well. Maybe I’ve moved into a spiritual perspective here, but I should ask if your thinking is that everything on Earth should exist solely for human exploitation under the religion of free market capitalism? THE OCEANS

Let’s say the oceans were divided up into privately owned sections as you want. History shows that, just like cattle rustling or corporate take-overs or invasion of other lands, people will encroach into territories other than their own to make a better profit, especially after they have destroyed their own place of business. Now, some places in the oceans have more whales than others. Do you really believe that a fishing company that owns a section will hire security to monitor such large sections of water? Will this really solve anything? Tell me what you think about the shrimp industry, whether farmed or trawled, and how this form of capitalism is not devastating our oceans and how it would not continue to do so if the oceans were privately owned? (Better read my book on this subject (The Shrimp Habit: How it is Destroying our World and What you Can Do About It?) first. If Ecuadorian shrimp farms managed to destroy most of their mangrove swamps before they realized they were about to go out of business and then adopted ecological processes, what does this say about the free market and short term thinking of capitalism? Even with this knowledge, Mexican industries, knowing that they can make more money faster without the extra ecological measures, do it the worst way imaginable for the environment. Doesn’t this constitute more evidence that as long as greed and the lust for more and higher profits exists in free market capitalism, such problems will continue and must, at least temporarily, be regulated? And how can you use land as a positive model for how the oceans could be if they were also privatized? Do I need to cite how much forest has been destroyed worldwide? How much arable land is left? How many streams and lakes are polluted? How many cities have warnings about breathing the air? How much biodiversity has been lost? What real evidence do you have that privatizing water, whether forced as was tried by multinationals in Bolivia or promoted via false 51

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advertising as with many bottled water companies, is good for the ecology and for ecological justice? GANDHI AND MATERIALISM

I should have defined what I meant by “materialism” when I challenged it. When I use this word, I refer to how under the influence of Western and especially American capitalism, material goods and services have become valued excessively. In fact, many have written about this problem with Thoreau one of the most notable. Gandhi’s philosophy, greatly influenced by Thoreau, was about simplifying, reducing the consumption of material goods. You are saying he wore shoes or that I use a computer proves we are all materialists is true enough but completely misses any conception of “over consumption.” Such over- consumption, and I’ll let you define it in any way you wish, comes largely from the profit motive and the ability of large amounts of money to inspire people to buy more and more. Most places in the world, for example, use far less energy than does the U.S. Gandhi’s example simply demonstrates that consumerism can go too far. Overconsumption by one group can lead to underconsumption by another in ways that are doing violence to the have-nots. Such violence, as you recall, is an SEEJ problem. Do you disagree with this idea? You say that “scarcity has nothing to do with materialism.” Would you say that overconsumption of hamburgers and wood materials for building and paper have nothing to do with an “overly materialistic” culture? Would you say that such a demand for products, motivated by industry creating the consumer needs as much as the consumer wanting them independently, has had anything to do with deforestation? SEEJ IN HIGHER EDUCATION

You conclude by stating that faculty can teach anything they want but that if they are going to teach the truth they should teach that free enterprise is the best way to protect the environment. Based on our experience with all versions of free enterprise, from McDonald’s to Monsanto that exist not in theory but in reality, would you not at least concede that some discussion about the pros and cons in light of the historical record is more scholarly? Walter, your arguments remind me of those I have with a cousin who is a Christian fundamentalist (which is why I listed that possibility above.) He is a brilliant physician, director of an HMO, an astronomer, and a very generous person. I am always unsuccessful in trying to make a connection between structural deficiencies in his religion and how they have caused great harm in the world. He generally responds by saying that this is because all problems resulted merely from misinterpretation or misapplication of the intended structures. If the idea of free market capitalism that you embrace is also so full of misinterpretation and misapplication in the historical record, don’t we have a similar problem? As an American Indian who lives as best he can in two different worlds, I nonetheless embrace, at least philosophically, the worldview that our Indigenous ancestors 52

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practiced for tens of thousands of years in ways that preserved natural systems. I claim this was done intentionally far more effectively than has ever been the case under the system of private property and capitalism that has destroyed much in a very short while. I note that the Indigenous world view would not think private possession of land is sacred at all. Possessing rivers, lakes, mountains or forests was an inconceivable concept. Yet both your libertarian and my Indigenous worldview also reject central government, hierarchal structures, and regulations on liberties. So in a way our ultimate goals are similar. So where can we go with our two views that can make sense in the light of history? I realize that capitalism has brought forth an amazing technical lifestyle and ability to travel, etc. I also realize that Indigenous people were and are being attacked constantly as are their lands. Should college students talk about private property as a questionable practice? Should we all discuss what happens when one believes in private property as sacred and the other believes that Nature is sacred (too sacred to be owned privately)? The Indigenous value system, which emphasized generosity over greed in all matters, managed to maintain a harmony with natural systems for more than sixty thousand years. Now, unless you want to quote me the BS about Indians not intentionally caring for the environment, running buffalo off of cliffs or overusing seafood, things that I and other scholars expose as falsehoods in my University of Texas Press text, Unlearning the Language of Conquest, would you not at least add that in addition to teaching about your version of free market, private ownership in colleges, that some research and dialogue about the Indigenous way would be warranted? CONCLUDING REMARKS

One thing I have come to possibly accept that I did not imagine I would is that both our philosophies ultimately are based on the premise that human nature, when truly left to its own accord, will take care of others or at least try to do so sincerely. I do not think it is natural to destroy one’s environment or make war. I have come to realize that your trust in libertarianism somehow relates to this positive view of humans. Am I wrong? I also believe we both are against any coercion from any source occurs, whether a powerful and wealthy capitalist, a government official or a “bleeding heart liberal.” Such pressures cause a chain reaction that increases the odds that the offence/defense posturing of people begins a cycle that causes everyone to lose sight of their highest consciousness. Do you know what I mean? Are we close on this do you think? What I wish we could do, and it seems unlikely at this point, is come to terms with how the examples of capitalism as it has generally been practiced throughout history have caused such a terrible ecological situation. But maybe you will have some insight in your reply. Walter: I was once in a public debate with a young man when I was a Professor at Holy Cross College in the 1990s; he was then a recently minted Ph.D. in biology 53

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with a specialty in environmentalism. In his entire experience, he had never even once heard of the school of thought I favor, free market environmentalism. If I had to define this briefly, it would be that it is an economic analysis of ecological problems, predicated upon an appreciation of private property rights and the benefits of free enterprise. If there is one constant refrain in this perspective, it is that the environmental problems we now face stem from a lack of laissez faire capitalism, and the solution to them is to uphold this system. As I was explaining this to the audience, I was watching my debate opponent out of the corner of my eye. First, a puzzled look came over his face; he didn’t quite understand what I was talking about. But then, quite quickly, he grasped the gist of it. (He was a bright fellow, after all, despite his disagreement with me.) And, do you know what his reaction was, Four Arrows? He burst out into laughter. Not just a few giggles emanated from him. This was a full out rolling on the floor, grasping for breath, type of reaction. Nor, was it posed, in order to denigrate me and my position. Honestly, it just struck him as hilarious that anyone could seriously articulate the viewpoint I was defending. This experience was the most dramatic of all of my presentations of free market environmentalism. But, whenever I lecture to hostile (e.g., non libertarian) audiences, I get much the same reaction, albeit sometimes less spectacular than that one. My speeches are met with derision, hostility, booing, etc. Your description (“truly puzzled, even mortified”) is somewhat along these lines. My freshman classes respond in much the same way, although given the context, they are a bit more subdued. I fear that many of the readers of this book will be shocked by free market environmentalism. So, I shall take more care than usual to spell out this philosophy, as per your request of me. I begin with Adam Smith’s (1776) famous doctrine of the “invisible hand” (I do indeed think you are “missing the boat” with regard to it): ... every individual necessarily labours to render the annual revenue of the society as great as he can. He generally, indeed, neither intends to promote the public interest, nor knows how much he is promoting it. By preferring the support of domestic to that of foreign industry, he intends only his own security; and by directing that industry in such a manner as its produce may be of the greatest value, he intends only his own gain, and he is in this, as in many other cases, led by an invisible hand to promote an end which was no part of his intention. Nor is it always the worse for the society that it was no part of it. By pursuing his own interest he frequently promotes that of the society more effectually than when he really intends to promote it. I have never known much good done by those who affected to trade for the public good. POLLUTION

Here is yet another way to define free market environmentalism: it is an attempt to apply the “invisible hand” to ecological issues. This is precisely what I meant when I said, above, that “the polluters were led by Adam Smith’s ‘invisible hand,’ to 54

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substitute clean burning, but more expensive anthracite coal for the cheaper and dirty burning sulphur coal previously in use.” I think this “make(s) little sense to (you) now” because it is so new and startling to you. But a bit of reflection, I think, will convince you of its truth. If you were a manufacturer, or a railroad owner, and wanted to maximize profits, under which regime do you think you would give more consideration to the environment (e.g., refrain from trespassing your sparks or smoke particles onto the property of other people)? Under the legal code that existed in the early part of the 19th century, wherein if you engaged in this outrage you would very likely be subjected severe penalties (made to pay damages to your victims, and issued an injunction to cease and desist from your anti social behaviour which, if ignored, would land you in the pokey)? Or, under the auspices of the regime of law that held sway from the latter part of the 19th century, until the mid to latter part of the 20th century, in which you could far more easily pollute with impunity? Does this mean that in the earlier period every polluter was dealt with, harshly, by the forces of law and order? Not at all. Nor does this imply that in the later epoch all those who spewed forth crap into the air and water were able to get away with these despicable acts? Of course not. I was careful to say that there was only a tendency in this regard. I did state, “Given that the pollution problem was not perfectly solved....” Thus, your historical examples, while illuminating, are somewhat beside the point. My position “holds water” despite your mention of Dickens, coal from Newcastle, Ben Franklin, and several British cases. My focus was on the U.S. I think you are required to disprove my claim that there was a preponderance of lawfulness in the earlier period, such that the “invisible hand” functioned reasonably well then, but that this legal regime was much less respected in the later period. My claim is buttressed mainly by Horwitz (1977) and Rothbard (1982). I am no historian, much less a legal historian. Horwitz and Rothbard are (well, the latter is an expert in pretty much everything pertaining to the humane sciences). I have to rely on someone in this regard. If you want to undermine the free market analysis of air pollution, you are obliged, I think, to counter the claim of these publications that there was a sea change in the law of nuisance between these two epochs. Yet, at least so far, you have made no effort in that direction. You will undoubtedly be tempted to react to the above by saying something along the lines of, “Why should I assume the role of a profit making large scale business, let alone one that wants to maximize them? They are all evil. They are the cause of air pollution.” Please do not give into this temptation. I ask this for two reasons. First, it is irrelevant to my main point: that a sharp (but by no means total) disconnect in the legal regime during the progressive period of the late 19th century was largely responsible for our air pollution problems. If you want to refute that point of mine, I maintain that you have to offer evidence that there was no such change in the findings of the courts. Second, profits are not at all the bogey man you make them out to be. Permit me now to comment on several other points of contention between us, in an attempt to promote a greater understanding between us. I did not at all say that “regulatory laws like the Clean Air Act cause corporations to pollute.” Well, at least I didn’t mean to say any such thing. Yes, these laws take 55

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credit for an undoubted improvement in the cleanliness of the air we now enjoy, but the problem was caused, initially, not by the marketplace; instead, it was created by the governmental judiciary during the progressive period. I did indeed mention Holman v. Athens Empire Laundry Co. (1919). This is not a “1919 law.” Rather, it is judicial finding of that year. It is a very important court decision. It perfectly exemplifies what I am trying to say. When air pollution is not “actionable,” this means that it is not against the law. Suppose man A rapes woman B. The police arrest A and drag him to court. If rape is not “actionable,” this means that the judge will set A free, even in the face of proof that this dastardly act took place; B would have had no protection from the legal system, none at all. Now, if rape were legal, I don’t imagine that every man would continually rape every woman. The overwhelming majority of men are far more decent than that, the allegations of some fanatical feminists to the contrary notwithstanding. But, surely, there would be more rapes under such a legal regime than at present; probably, many, many more. It is the same with air pollution. If it is contrary to law, and judges mete out severe penalties to those who spew forth their debris upon all and sundry, we will certainly have fewer trespassing smoke and soot particles wending their way all over the place; in all probability, there will be much less pollution. If, on the other hand, factories are given carte blanche to engage in this activity (pollution is not “actionable” as in the 1919 judicial finding I cited), then there will be more of it, much more, especially if the perpetrators can earn extra profits thereby, and drive into bankruptcy all who keep the waste products of their manufacturing to themselves. This has nothing at all to do with “other motivations, presumably free market demand and supply laws,” stopping pollution. As it happens, there is no such thing as a “free market demand and supply law…” The law of supply and demand works independently of the free market in any case; yes, it functions in a regime of economic freedom, but this is true under economic interventionism, too, such as in the case of minimum wages or rent control. What motivates manufacturers to “cease and desist from violating the property rights of environmental victims” are laws prohibiting them from doing so, and judges who enforce these laws; that is, make these uninvited border crossings “actionable.” This 1919 case is the veritable “smoking gun” (so to speak) of the Rothbard and Horwitz analysis of pollution in the U.S. It is of crucial importance. I fear it is somewhat of a misreading of my viewpoint to mention “a business (that) curtailed or prevented pollution on its own, without pressure … from laws.” It must be a rare case indeed where a manufacturer did so, especially, given what I say above, regarding the “position of a libertarian, or ‘green’ railroad, or factory.” Of course you can easily “cite fifty (examples) where it required such pressure.” That is exactly what I am saying. Perhaps, then, our views are not as far apart as might be thought from a superficial reading of what has transpired so far. We both agree, do we not, that laws against pollution, and judges who back them up, are the sine qua non, of attaining clean air? I further maintain, supported by Horwitz and Rothbard, that these laws were at least approximately in operation in the period 1830–1840 and that the rug was pulled out from this legal regime during the later 56

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progressive period. Were there any instances of the law against pollution being upheld in the later period? Of course there were. But as the Holman case of 1919 shows, sometimes this law was totally disregarded. You are quite right in pointing out the many suits where proper law was upheld in the 1880s and thereafter. But, it cannot be denied that this was less so in the later time period. By the way, the progressive period is usually calculated as from about the 1880s to the 1920s, so your cite of a “recent Ohio decision” (Hunt, 2010) comes a bit late. If fear this minor error on your part was due to my initial lack of clarity. Hopefully, I am now making up for that lacunae. I do not aver that later cases “hinge on the 1919 case (I) cited,” merely that this was one very important illustration of my point. A WORLD OF DIFFERENCE?

I maintain that there is a world of difference between the two different types of corporations I mentioned, and I respect your arguments to the contrary. But, I will not respond to them in this chapter, as a discussion of them would take us too far afield, in my opinion, from its subject, the environment. Why, then, did I mention them at all? I think it is because you started in on this first, in your initial position statement, where you castigated “corporate profit.” I certainly agree with you that this is an important topic, and will be happy to discuss it with you in our chapter on economics. However, I am also of the opinion that the concept of profit is germane to the subject of this chapter (otherwise I wouldn’t have raised the invisible hand idea), and will continue to try to convince you of the benefits of the profit and loss system for ecological considerations. BUFFALOS AND BARNYARDS

Let us talk about profit. I know this will at least initially be uncomfortable for many of our readers, but, please, bear with me. If you and they want to become fully acquainted with free market environmentalism, a better explication of my understanding of it is important. Profit is ubiquitous. It is involved in every act we undertake. Let me choose a rather mundane example for illustration purposes. You brush your teeth in the morning, you profiteer, you. That is, you make the following sort of monetary cost benefit calculation (you despicable creature, you): if I brush my teeth, my gains are a cleaner mouth, a more pleasant appearance and a lower risk of cavities. On the other hand, my time is worth, oh, $100 per hour, to pick a round figure. Teeth brushing will take 5 minutes, so it will cost me one twelfth of that, or, about $8.25. I’ll use up $.10 worth of toothpaste, and the wear and tear on my toothbrush will add up to another $.05, for a grand total of $8.40. Well, should I or shouldn’t I brush my teeth? It all depends upon whether the costs or benefits are higher. Suppose you calculate that your benefits from cleaning your fangs are equal to $10.00. Then, you will brush your teeth, because you will earn a profit! of $10.00 – $8.40 = $1.60. (Are you disgusted with yourself yet?). On the other hand, if there is a fire in your house, you’re not going to brush your teeth, at least not at that moment. Your calculations will change. The costs of 57

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staying by your sink and brushing will be very much higher: burns, failure to save your loved ones, possible death. Then, while the benefits of teeth brushing still remain at $10.00, the costs will have risen, say, to $100,000. So, if you stay and brush your teeth in the face of a fire, you will not make a profit; rather, you will suffer a loss, of $10 - $100,000 - $99,990. Not only are you an evil profit seeker, you are, even more egregiously, a profit maximizer. (I hate to say this, Four Arrows, but I am now filled with loathing for you ☺). Let’s get back to an ordinary no-house-on-fire day. We have said that you brush your teeth for 5 minutes. Why 5 minutes? Well, the first minute you really get a lot of crap out of your mouth; it is all over the place (as you can appreciate, I’m putting a bit of myself into this). You hit the really bad spots first. In the second minute, your productivity has fallen a bit in this regard, but it is still up there. Ditto for the third and fourth minutes; as time goes one, you are hitting seriously diminishing returns. You still continue, because the benefits outweigh the costs, and profit is rolling in every minute, but it is decreasing, assuming equal costs per minute but declining benefits. In your fifth minute, the profits are getting very small; with each second, they decrease. You stop at the 5 minute mark because you have exploited all the profits that are to be had out of this exercise. You will not go to six minutes, because the benefits you derive from this sixth minute will be less than the assumed constant costs. Heck, you will not continue for one second past that 5 minute mark, lest you not maximize your profits. Do you make this calculation on a conscious basis? Of course not. But, how else are we to explain your willingness to brush your teeth for precisely 5 minutes (or however long you do this for) and not one second more or less? We have only touched the very tip of the iceberg with this example. As I have said, profit (and loss) considerations are ubiquitous. They encompass all aspects of your life. You buy a newspaper for $1.00. You value it at more than that amount, otherwise you would not have purchased it (you may throw it away immediately after you have purchased it, not wanting it at all; your desire was only to impress someone with the fact that you can read; but there is necessarily something about that newspaper that you valued at more than $1.00). Your profit is the difference to you between the value you placed upon that periodical, and the monetary cost to you. If you value it at $1.50, and it costs you $1.00, then you have made a cool $.50 profit on this deal. The vendor, too, earns a profit at your “expense.” He valued that one newspaper at a very low rate. If he didn’t sell it to you, he might have had to dispose of it in the garbage, and that would have cost him something, say, $.15. So he actually earns a profit of the $1.00 you pay for it, plus the $.15 he thereby saves, for a grand total of $1.15. One way to say this is that you both exploited each other. But, this is silly. Rather, a correct analysis is that you both benefited (in the ex ante sense of anticipations) from this cooperative act with each other. Every time a commercial interaction takes place there is mutual profit (or loss, ex post). You hire me to wash your car for $20. You value a clean car at $25. So you earn a profit of $5. I place a value on my labor of $12. So I profit from this deal by $8. All the free market is, is the concatenation of all such trades, purchases, sales, rentals, investments. They are all profitable in precisely the sense in which teeth-brushing or newspaper sales are. 58

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There are two and only two human motivations: monetary and psychic profit. All others fall into these two categories. We have already discussed the former. What of the latter? Are all costs and benefits merely and strictly monetary? Certainly not. In the previous example we have seen that the clean taste in your mouth, your future health, the safety of those who live in your house, are all incorporated into your economic calculation. The preeminent type of non monetary profit, psychic, is benevolence (and, for nasty people, malevolence). We contribute to charity, because we profit thereby. We get more utility out of a dollar of ours in the hands of, say, a poor or needy person, than in our own wallets. The difference to us between those two values is our psychic profit. Now let us apply what we have so far said about profit to environmental issues. If it is important to save endangered species (I won’t go into why; I am sure you agree with me on this), then it behooves us to mobilize all human motivations to this end, not just some of them. And that means, certainly, not only psychic profits, but monetary ones, too. Hence, “barnyards” for elephants, rhinos, tigers, and other such creatures. If we want to save them, it is not enough to harness compassion, only, to this end. It is simply too week a reed, alone, to rely upon. We should want also to unleash, yes, capitalists, to meet this challenge, whose economic prosperity depends, intimately, upon to well-being of these animals. So, yes, barnyards. Elephants, rhinos and tigers can be big money makers, if their owners have an incentive to profit from them. Right now, in all too many places, poachers kill elephants just for their tusks, allowing the valuable meat and skin to rot in the jungle. Pregnant rhinos are slaughtered for their valuable horns, and young female tigers for their by-products. No owner of these resources (I use this word advisedly, knowing it will raise your hackles, but, I am asking you to look at this matter through the eyes of a profit maximizer of the monetary sort), would allow any such thing, unless the client paid real big bucks. I think the cow and buffalo example is very telling. These are similar types of animals, one in a barnyard, the other roaming free. One never came within a million miles of extinction, the other within a hair’s breath. Does this not tell you something, and something important? What are your reservations about this sort of thing? You think it is “vulgar” to “place monetary considerations ahead of all others.” First of all, this is not typically true. Even the capitalist pig values a big teak desk, a thick rug in his office, pretty secretaries and other non monetary values. But suppose it were true most or all of the time; this still constitutes a distraction from the point at issue: do you or do you not want to save these species, even if “vulgarity” is part of the cost? As for me, I say, vulgarity, schmulgarity; I don’t give a tinker’s damn about any such superficial consideration. I just want to preserve those species. And, I am sure you will agree with me that vulgarity is a small price to pay for preservation of these valuable animals. You maintain that I ignore the costs of the disappearance to the Indians. Not at all. No one can talk about everything of interest in every sentence, paragraph, or even section of a chapter, let alone an entire book. Of course, this was costly to the Indians, and to others, too. My focus was not on which people were hurt by the anti capitalist, non barnyardization, of the buffalo, that lead to their almost entire disappearance. 59

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Rather, I was trying get at the cause of that sad fact. I mentioned cost in the economists’ sense of alternative costs to try to explain why it is that the cow survived, easily, while the buffalo came close to extinction. I was trying to get into the head of the person who could shoot either one of them, through economic analysis. Let me now reiterate the point I was trying to make; perhaps I was not clear enough. The potential cow shooter faced a significantly high cost: the loss of having that bovine around tomorrow, which would have inevitably occurred had he not slaughtered it today, since he owned it. The potential buffalo killer faced no such cost; indeed, his alternative cost was pretty much zero. That is, if he refrained from shooting this particular buffalo, he would not have suffered its loss on the morrow, since it would have run away, far away, and he wouldn’t have had it anyway. So, why not shoot it today, since the cost of doing so is exceedingly low. Downward sloping demand, and all that. I had taken it for granted that we would agree that the near disappearance of the buffalo would be a great cost to the Indians (here, I am using the word “cost” in a different sense, as a loss). But, since you query me here, I will be more explicit. Yes, non ownership, non private property rights, non barnyardization for the buffalo, harmed the Indians. It was a great cost to them. Their economic welfare plummeted greatly as a result. I fully agree with you on this, and thank you for helping me better make this distinction. You then mention a whole host of considerations which I see as somewhat irrelevant to my point that private property rights and free enterprise, and nothing else, is the solution to species extinction: “the intentional policy of the U.S. government to destroy the Indian way of life,” “The government provided free ammunition for people to kill the animals,” “the 1830 Indian Removal Act,” “President Grant.” None of this is at all pertinent to my (well, not really “my” but you know what I mean) thesis. Consider those bullets that the government gave out to people to enable them to slaughter the buffalo; they could have used them for an entirely different purpose: to shoot cows. But, they did not. Why not? Again, because bovines were privately owned, and buffalo were not. You object to “putting all creatures into some sort of zoo as a way to save them” on the ground that this will “devalue that which cannot be directly tied to money, and the unfettered, unregulated pursuit of it.” Why denigrate zoos, as in “some sort of zoo?” Again, I ask, do you, or do you not, want to save these animals from extinction? If so, are you able to overcome your visceral repugnance for zoos? I ask that you consider doing just that. Yes, I had initially mentioned “barnyards,” but I am just as ready to accept zoos. My error was in thinking of the slaughter of cows; hence “barnyards. But, elephants, rhinos, tigers, etc., have more value than only their body parts. For example, safaris (in these gigantic “zoos”); big game hunters are willing to pay thousands of dollars (in despised money that will enable the capitalist to maintain his equally reviled profits) to shoot these creatures. Paradoxically, that is the last best hope we have for their survival. As for the “the unfettered, unregulated pursuit” of lucre, where did you get that from? Certainly, I have never said any such thing. I have a long paper trail of publications; you will not unearth anything like that in any of them. Very much to the contrary, I do indeed favor “fetters” and “regulations” in the quest for profits. To wit, the libertarian non aggression axiom: no 60

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one may use mercantilist, statist means of attaining wealth, or steal it in any other way. Other than that, it is laissez faire all the way as far as I am concerned. You state that “History … shows that the decimation of species originated by business and industry making room for themselves at the expense of the flora and fauna. Game preserves were not set up, except as relates to a few private hunter clubs…” I beg to differ. The highest profile risks to species were buffalo in the U.S, caribou in Alaska, wolves in Wyoming and various fauna in Africa and India, places not at all known for “business and industry.” Just what “history” are you relying upon to make this statement? Please specify. You offer the view that these game preserves were set up not “by private industry, but by public entities.” You are quite correct. However, you neglect to appreciate the fact that private capitalist profit seekers were prohibited by law from doing any such thing. It is a bit harsh to denigrate entrepreneurs for not doing something for which they could be jailed. Until very recently, it was illegal to set up a ranch or farm for these exotic animals. You ask if the black market is the free market. Yes, certainly, it is. The black market was in part responsible for enabling the Soviet Union to persist in its evil and inefficient socialist practices for as long as it did. But, to characterize what the poachers did, first, illegally slaughter animals and then sell them against the law, as the operation of the “free market,” is highly problematic. For free enterprise to really be operational in this domain, elephants, rhinos, tigers, wolves, etc., would be able to be legally treated exactly like cows, pigs, chickens and other barnyard animals. Economic rationality (private property, profit and loss, the usual commercial practices) would operate in the former case, as it now does in the latter. Yes, of course, ivory, rhino powder, tiger testicles, etc., would be sold in the open and legal market. This would be the last best hope for the survival of these endangered species, just as is the meat of the barnyard inhabitants the ticket to their own continuation. Their high value would save them from extinction; under such institutional arrangements they would not be a target for poachers. To be absolutely clear on this, I do not favor the present system where poachers indiscriminately kill endangered species. Yes, they are part of the black market, and, I do indeed favor the black market vis a vis pure socialism, but, even more, far more, do I argue in behalf of pure laissez faire capitalism, where no black market is needed. Let me explain this rather complicated point by analogy. In my view, we ought to have a completely free market in addictive drugs. There should be no laws against them (except for children). At present, heroin, cocaine, marijuana, are prohibited (in virtually all jurisdictions). Do I support the black market? Yes, I do. These criminals are doing nothing incompatible with libertarian law by supplying these products to willing buyers (I now abstract from the fact that drug dealers often kill innocent people.) But, far more than arguing in behalf of the role these denizens of the black market play at present, I defend the complete legalization of all drugs, so that a black market would not be needed. I adopt the same position with regard to black market poachers. Yes, they do harm, they kill endangered species. However the fault is animal socialism. Black market drug dealers also hurt people. They provide impure products (the equivalent of bathtub gin during the 61

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prohibition of alcohol). But, again, the underlying blame is properly to be laid at the door of outlawing drugs. Black marketers in the Soviet Union were no angels either. But the culpability belongs, properly, to Communism, not them. Without drug outlawry, the economic system of the U.S.S.R., bans on private ownership of exotic species, there would be no black markets in any of these cases. That is the system I advocate. You speak positively about these endangered species being “allowed … to roam in their natural habitat as opposed to zoos or ‘barnyards.’” I am not comfortable with your use of scare quotes for the word “barnyards.” Barnyards are perfectly legitimate places. They have the effect (their owners do not necessarily have the intention – remember the invisible hand) of keeping these animals alive, and thus providing value for human beings. The difficulty with allowing these creatures “to roam in their natural habitat” is that to do so is to sound their death knell. This sort of “animal freedom,” precludes their commercialization. If they can travel wherever they please, businesses cannot earn profits from protecting them, breeding them, and, yes, of course, slaughtering them. Why is it so difficult to get across the point to many people that cows, sheep, turkeys, are treated in precisely this manner, and there is no danger whatsoever of their extinction? Of course, the barnyards will have to be bigger, and the fences stronger, for elephants and lions than for ducks and geese. With the prices of ivory, rhino horns, etc., this can be done on a profitable basis. Yes, of course, “everything on Earth should exist solely for human exploitation under the religion of free market capitalism (emphasis added).” But, why do you characterize advocacy of what amounts in my opinion to no more and no less than justice, a “religion?” Would you feel comfortable if I engaged in name calling, and referred to your SEEJ as a “religion?” I somehow think not. Maybe I am too sensitive about this, but my school of economics, Austrianism, is often called “cultish” and dismissed as a mere exercise in religion, not science. I am sure you did not mean to insult me, but I would be happier if you dropped this sort of charge. What other reason do the fauna and flora of our planet exist, other than for “human exploitation?” That is, in my view, the earth and its accoutrements exist solely for our sakes, and for no other reason. They do not at all have intrinsic value, only instrumental value, as a means toward our ends. As I hope I have demonstrated to you, there really is no incompatibility between benefits for human beings, and survival of other species. That is, if we adopt laissez faire capitalism and free enterprise, where private enterprise and the profit and loss system mitigate against extinctions, via barnyards. There is one institution not yet mentioned by either of us: Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES). In the opinion of this organization, the best (only?) way to save these endangered animals is to ban trade in them. CITES maintains that if poachers cannot sell the tusks they gather to foreigners, they will have less of a financial incentive to engage in this practice in the first place. Well, true. But it is difficult to stop smugglers, as those charged with fighting the war on drugs have long known. Another, a better, way to eliminate this motive is of course privatization. 62

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I fear I do not see, yet, much overlap in our positions on ecology. Perhaps this will change, Four Arrows, in the further give and take of our discussions. However, I take comfort from the fact that we both oppose “state/private industry partnerships”; maybe we can solidify our mutual opposition to such fascism in our chapter on economics. THE OCEANS

Before responding to your very insightful challenges to ocean ownership (and I thank you profusely for taking me seriously on this; there are many, many, many who would not do me the honor of doing so; this is but one of the many, many, many reasons I enjoy interacting with you on these issues), let me review my position on this. I am trying to do my best to apply Adam Smith’s notion of the “invisible hand” to an arena neither he, nor most other scholars, contemplated. My thought is that with present common ownership, based on the thinking that pervades the United Nations’ motto, “the sea is the common heritage of all of mankind,” we will be continued to be victimized by the tragedy of the commons. It is only under a fully privatized ocean (seas, rivers, lakes, streams, etc.,) that we can escape this scourge. It is simply in no one’s individual interest that fish, whales and other such crops be depleted. Yet, each individual, acting on his own, has a selfish profit maximizing interest in grabbing up as much as he can, with no thought for the fact that if he does, there will likely be nothing available on the morrow. Many blame this on greed or selfishness or capitalism, or some such. But, this problem stems from non or common ownership of the oceans. The same greed or selfishness or capitalism operates with regard to most human endeavors. And, yet, as we have seen, it rears its ugly head only in the case of unowned resources such as buffalo, never privately held ones such as cattle. Rothbard (1956) puts the case beautifully: Private individuals and firms should definitely be able to own parts of the sea for fishing purposes. The present communism in the sea has led, inevitably, to progressive extermination of the fisheries, since it is to everyone’s interest to grab as many fish as he can before the other fellow does, and to no one’s interest to preserve the fishery resource. The problem would be solved if, on the first-ownership-to-first-user principle, parts of the sea could be owned by private enterprise. With this attempt to better explain my position, as you have asked me to do, I now turn to a consideration of your reservations about my thesis. You start off with the claim that under private ocean ownership “just like cattle rustling or corporate take-overs or invasion of other lands, people will encroach into territories other than their own to make a better profit, especially after they have destroyed their own place of business.” You ask me: “Do you really believe that a fishing company that owns a section will hire security to monitor such large sections of water? Will this really solve anything?” There are more areas of disagreement between us here than you can shake a stick at, but I will try to respond to them all. 63

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First of all, and perhaps most important, I have misgivings about the way you use the word “profit” here. Well, yes, I suppose, if I steal your car and drive away with it, there is a sense in which I have profited from my act (assuming I can get away with it, and have no moral scruples about such an act.) But, this is not at all the sense in which this word is used in the libertarian philosophy. Here, remember, the be all and end all is the non aggression axiom. We have agreed, have we not, that under your sense of social justice, and mine of plain old ordinary justice, that such acts would be strictly forbidden. Certainly, Smith’s invisible hand of earning profits and helping others does not contemplate this sort of use of that word. Second, I puzzled by your linkage of these three things: “cattle rustling, … corporate take-overs, …. invasion of other lands.” The first and third are totally incompatible with the free enterprise ethic. They are paradigmatic violations of the non aggression principle of libertarianism. The second is completely compatible with this type of morality. Wait a minute, Four Arrows, you sort of do have a point; I now, belatedly, see it. Let me try to clarify. I suppose there are really two ways to take over a corporation. One is through violence, as when the Godfather, a la the movie of that same name, tells a corporate president, “I will either have your signature on that contract selling me your entire corporation for $1, or your brains will be on it.” This type of corporate take-over fully deserves to be linked with the other two instances of the threat or initiation of violence. But, this is very far removed from the usual commercial corporate take-over. When Michael Milken took over a corporation, he did not do this at gun-point. Rather, he merely purchased sufficient shares in it to elect a new board of directors. And how did he get these shares? Through voluntary agreements with their owners. So, when you linked “cattle rustling, … corporate take-overs, …. invasions,” if you had criminal take overs in mind, then I see and agree with your point. But, if you meant ordinary commercial interactions, where one board of directors supplants another, then I must respectfully disagree with you. I guess what I am saying is that there can be no such thing as a “hostile” takeover in the free market system. Third, I do not think it is a legitimate argument against private property to say that theft of service or trespass could occur (“people will encroach into territories other than their own”). Suppose that t shirts are now owned in common. No one owns his own t shirt. Instead, we all initially take these shirts from a common pool. After we have worn them, we stick them in the common washing machine and dryer, and pluck out afterwards our t shirt for the day. However, under this system, we are all victimized by the tragedy of the commons. People just don’t take good care of their t shirts, in the knowledge that if they misuse the one they are wearing, they can always get another one out of the common pool. But, when we all do that, the quality of all our t shirts deteriorates. So, we now decide to privatize t shirts. But, there is an objection: if we each own our own t shirts, there will be, horrors, theft! People will steal each others’ t shirts. Would you consider this a valid argument against t shirt privatization? I sincerely hope not. Yes, of course, there is theft in the world. But, when these things are criminalized, the rate decreases, markedly. If not, we would hardly have a civilization. Yes, the jails are now full of criminals. But, a large portion of them are there for victimless crimes, incarcerated not for 64

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real rights violations such as theft, trespass, murder, rape; rather, for things they have every right to do: pornography, prostitution, drugs, gambling, etc. No, only a very small proportion of people are real criminals, so this objection can hardly be very compelling. If it were valid, it would prove too much, far too much. For there is criminal behavior with regard to virtually everything. Therefore, according to this perspective, private property should be banned entirely. Fourth, “Do you really believe that a fishing company that owns a section will hire security to monitor such large sections of water?” As I see things, either they will hire security, or they will do it themselves. Let us go back in history to the days before barbed wire. How did cattlemen keep track of who owned which cow? By branding, of course. (Was there cattle rustling? Sure, there was; but, in them thar days, they would hang rustlers, and this would put a severe damper on this practice.) We now have the technology to “brand” fish and whales, by sticking electronic monitoring devices into them. But, we can do better, far better. We can also utilize the modern aquatic equivalent of barbed wire. That is, electronic fences, to keep these fishies where we want them, not where they want to go (salmon are a complication, of course.) Let us have an end to “fish freedom.” Under capitalism, we will move from the hunting stage in the oceans, to farming. When we did so on the land, we moved from a species of a pitiful few humans, hiding in caves or in trees, to modern, civilized man. This is but one example of how far behind we are on three quarters of the earth’s surface, due to the lack of private property thereon and therein. Fifth, “Will this really solve anything?” You bet your boots it will solve something. To wit, it will cure the problem of over fishing and over whaling. It will also deal with issues such as oil spills. If I owned a patch of ocean, I would charge far more to owners of old singled hulled leaky ships than modern air tight double hulled ones. If a breakup of an oil tanker occurred in my area, not only would it be disastrous for my own fish, whales, etc., but I would be liable to my neighbors, whether land or ocean owners, for this gunk if it spread onto their property (that is, under the 1830s type of law I favor). It would also address, in the same manner and in the same way, the issue of “plastic debris in our oceans (such as Nestle water bottles).” And this certainly includes “the North Pacific Gyre’s plastic garbage patch and the four others like it around the world…” Nestle, of course, is not responsible for the use its customers make of its product, any more than is Smith and Wesson guilty of murders committed with its weapons. You next raise the issue of fish and shrimp farming. I support it. No, let me correct that. I am wildly in favor of it. Of course, I oppose fish or shrimp farms that pollute other people’s (marine) property. In equal measure, harking back to our air pollution discussion, I am also against manufacturers that send their pollutants wafting over onto other people’s property. You ask, what does it say “about the free market and short term thinking of capitalism” when “Ecuadorian shrimp farms managed to destroy most of their mangrove swamps.” I think that if these shrimp farms destroyed their own mangrove swamps, well, that’s just the way the cookie crumbles. There are always business failures. Bankruptcy is part and parcel of free enterprise; you can’t make an omelet without breaking eggs. Those who misuse resources suffer losses, and are forced through the market to exit that particular field. Hopefully, these 65

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shrimp farmers will be able to move into another industry where they can better contribute to society, by earning profits, instead of suffering losses. However, suppose these self same shrimp (or fish) farmers destroy mangrove swamps owned by others. That is a horse of entirely a different color. Those people should be subject to the full force of the law, up to and including being put in jail. Heck, they should have been stopped long before they managed to completely “destroy” someone else’s property. The victims of this water borne pollution should have access to 1830–1840 type U.S. courts that by and large upheld libertarian law against trespass. Of course these despicable polluters “can make more money faster without the extra ecological measures, do it the worst way imaginable for the environment.” That is precisely what I have been criticizing. And, the cause of this evil is judicial findings such as that 1919 Holman case. Perhaps now it will be more clear to you that we are actually on the same side of these matters. I may well have been insufficiently clear about what I am advocating. Well, I’m doing my best. I hope I have by now completely disabused you of the notion “that as long as greed and the lust for more and higher profits exists in free market capitalism, such problems will continue.” No, no, no, a thousand times no, “greed,” and “lust for … profits” have absolutely nothing to do with the issue. As I tried to make clear, you, too, are a “luster” after profits, in your teeth brushing, and indeed every other act you engage in. Right now, as you read the material in this paragraph, you are undoubtedly reacting to it, with a view to either agreeing or disagreeing with me, right? You are soon going to write your reply to it? Why? So as to garner profits, you capitalist pig, you (☺). The only reason you’ll now write, or, continue reading, even continue breathing, is that you think there is something in it for you if you do, namely, wait for it, profits. Yes, you will only continue dealing with our book at the time you read this if you think that the benefits of so doing outweigh the attendant costs. If you do not, namely, if you think you will suffer losses (negative profit), you will go off and do something else, maybe, brush your teeth, or go for a jog or a handball game. The cause of these problems is fish farmers, or manufacturers, or railroads, who are allowed with impunity to throw their crap at other people and onto their property. And why is that? Because the law allows this. You ask, must this not “at least temporarily, be regulated?” Well, I don’t know about this “temporary” business. I think that property rights should be protected permanently. And, I don’t much like that word “regulated.” It smacks too much of government interference with markets and capitalism. I want perpetrators of pollution to be jailed (subject to the qualifications specified by Rothbard, 1982) if they disobey injunctions to cease and desist from polluting, and/or fail to pay damages. But, I don’t want to get into a mere verbal dispute with you. If this is what you mean by “regulated,” then I heartily agree. You ask, “…. how can (I) use land as a positive model for how the oceans could be if they were also privatized? Do I need to cite how much forest has been destroyed worldwide? How much arable land is left? How many streams and lakes are polluted?” We have quite a few disagreements (I think they are not merely verbal, but I am getting less and less sure of that as I go on responding to you) here. Most 66

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destruction of forest has to do with public or non ownership. Some, of course, can be traced to private sources. But, the free enterprise system is designed to give us the optimal amount of trees. In much the same way as you brush your teeth for 5 minutes, no more and no less, laissez faire capitalism will give us precisely the amount of forest coverage we need, based on the people’s choices, their time preferences, mediated through their dollar votes. (Wait, I exaggerate, somewhat; this is true only when the market is in equilibrium, which it never is, but we are always tending in that direction). I’ll more fully elaborate on all this when we get to our economics chapter, but here is a brief account. Let us suppose that the optimal amount of forests is 30% of the land (I pick this number merely for illustration purposes.) Let us suppose that 50% of the earth is now covered by trees. Then, profits will be earned by cutting down the trees. Hey, we need room for people too; for office buildings, golf courses (see below for more on this amenity), factories, homes. On the other hand, if trees account for only10% of the land, then profits can be earned by planting more of them. Those who zig when they should be zagging, or zag when they should be zigging, in either the 50% or the 10% scenario, will lose profits, make losses, and tend to be forced into bankruptcy. The invisible hand really works. Plenty of “lakes and streams” are polluted. Most, because they are unowned, and/or government refuses to uphold property rights. But, is the optimal amount of dirty lakes and streams zero? Maybe, maybe not. This can only be rationally decided thought the profit and loss system of private property, where they are all owned by people who stand to make losses if they cannot anticipate consumer demand properly in this regard. We do want some garbage dumps, do we not? Why should aqueous resources be exempt, as long as there is no leakage from them to other people’s property? You query “What real evidence do you have that privatizing water, whether forced as was tried by multinationals in Bolivia or promoted via false advertising as with many bottled water companies, is good for the ecology and for ecological justice?” My evidence for this is profit and loss considerations. If government does a poor job providing water, they stay on at the same lemonade stand forever. Think of the post office, the motor vehicle bureau, and public roads (which kill some 40,000 people on an annual basis). If a private water dispenser screws up, they are history. They are gone. (See my list of large companies that are no longer with us.) The mere existence of bottled water is exhibit “A” in the indictment of public provision. The government gives it away for free, and the people prefer to pay private firms for it? Give me a break. Needless to say, I oppose Bolivian (or any other) force, and certainly fraudulent advertising. My only point with regard to Nestles had to do with impure statist water. I relish responding to your very interesting other criticisms of my view on Nestle, but shall do so in our chapter on economics, where I think it will be more relevant. Four Arrows, the fact that you mention “corporations … that focus on the quarterly profit report to the exclusion of any authentic concern for what their product does to the environment,” shows either that you are unaware of Smith’s “invisible hand” argument, or that you reject it. If the former, please consider immersing yourself in 67

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this literature. If the latter, please explain why you reject this cornerstone of all economics. The point is, were property rights fully respected, the only way to maximize profits would be to ensure that you did not violate the environment (e.g., other people’s property.) RIVERS

Not only should oceans be privatized, but so should rivers. Let me address two issues. First, why should we want to do this, and second, how might this be done? Rivers should be turned over to the private sector in order to better facilitate commerce on them, so as to better address pollution problems, and because government ownership is irresponsible; it needlessly kills people. Some rivers are now becoming so crowded that a way must be found to ration this scarce resource amongst those competing for them, where the demand is greater than the supply. Privatization would allow the price system to take on this task; it would do so as it does for butter, beer, bicycles and bologna. But what of the objection that if this were done, the poor would not be able to fairly compete for river usage? The answer to this is that the poor, like everyone else, benefit from market prices. No one is seriously objecting to prices determining the distribution of butter, beer, bicycles and bologna. Is it seriously contended that the impecunious would be better off if the state organized these industries? If so, this furnishes evidence, only, that they have not yet learned the lesson from the debacle of the Soviet economy. River ownership would also reduce pollution. If farmers pollute the Acme river (and/of, if that river runs rampant over their acreage), or, if a manufacturer releases hot water into a stream which heats it up to the detriment of fish, swimmers, etc., this corporation would haul them into (an 1830s type of) court, unless of course, the farmers, and manufacturers were able to pay more for their uses than competitors, and ACME agreed to have them as customers. In either case, the river would then be used rationally. As to needless deaths from public ownership, a dramatic case in point concerns the Federal Emergency Management Association (FEMA), the Army Corps of Engineers, and the aftermath of hurricane Katrina (Anderson, 2005; Anderson and Kjar, 2008; Block, 2006B; Block and Rockwell, 2007; Carden, 2008; ChamleeWright and Rothschild, 2007; Chamlee-Wright, 2008; Cowen, 2006; Culpepper and Block, 2008; D’Amico, 2008; Dirmeyer, 2008; Lora, 2006; McGee, 2008; Murphy, 2005; Raskin, Kjar and Rahm, 2008; Stringham and Snow, 2008; Thornton, 1999; Vuk, 2006A, 2006B, 2008; Walker and Jackson, 2008; Westley, Murphy and Anderson, 2008; Young, 2008). FEMA announces itself on its website as “prepared, responsive and committed.” Yes, they were “prepared” to prevent private aid from being brought to New Orleans and its environs, they were “responsive” to bureaucratic orders emanating from Washington D.C. and they were “committed” to killing people. The Army Corps of Engineers brags about “building and maintaining America’s infrastructure.” Sure, tell that to the people of New Orleans, the needlessly dead, due to poorly built levies, and those who are still mourning for them. When and if libertarians ever get a chance to hold a Nuremberg trial, the leaders of these 68

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organizations, along with leading U.S. imperialists, will find themselves in the dock. Now that we have considered reasons why we should privatize rivers, how can this best be done? In the view of Rothbard (1956): What’s the solution (to the problem of) fixing the ownership of flowing water(?)… We must concentrate first … in trying to visualize an ideal arrangement. After the ideal is known, then one can begin working toward it…. The ideal for scarce goods … is first-ownership-to-first-user. … the route to justice lies along the appropriation rather than the riparian path. Why riparian? What claim does a landowner have to any part of a stream just because his land adjoins the stream? No moral claim whatever. His riparian claim is not based on his having made use of the water; in fact, his only purpose seems to be to block anyone else from using the water, and the result is criminal waste of rivers and streams… The way to amend the appropriation method is as follows: eliminate all requirements for “beneficial” use — the term is meaningless, and can only be concretely decided on the free market; the water must be the appropriator’s absolute property, not at the sufferance of the State. Hence, he must be free to sell his right to the water to anyone else for any purpose, or to stop using it altogether. If he fails either to use his property right or sell it, the inference is that it is not worth using on the market. At any rate, the decision must be the property owner’s — the appropriator’s. How to establish the absolute appropriation method … whether with or without compensation to the present riparian owners — is something that must be settled. If downstream owners want to avoid pollution, there is one simple way they can do so, under the appropriation method: buy the stream together — as a corporation, perhaps — from the first appropriators, and then put it to non-polluting uses, or keep it “fallow” altogether. That is one way to proceed. The key element in here is that those who have been using the river, are the rightful owners. In Rothbard’s view, this is not the land owners on either side of this body of water, and I think this is correct. In a lake, particularly a small one, however, it might well be that the owners of the land abutting this body of water are the most likely users of it, and, hence, the rightful owners. With regard to highway privatization (Block, 2009), it is far easier to determine the users with property abutting this facility, than those who live elsewhere. Modifications of the Rothbard rule might be justified in these other venues. If we could adopt a God’s eye perspective, then we would know, unerringly, who are the legitimate owners. In the real world, we have to scrape along as best we can on this question. GANDHI AND MATERIALISM

As far as I am concerned, the world would be a far better place if instead of rap and country music, people listened to Bach and Mozart; played handball instead of 69

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football; donated more money for research and development on space exploration and curing cancer, MS and AIDS (if the government hadn’t wasted a significant part of the GDP every year, we might have already attained these goals) and less on beer and cigarettes. Other pet peeves of mine: more students should major in economics, and fewer in sociology; we should arrange matters so that rainfall occurs only between 2am and 4am (if the government hadn’t wasted a significant part of the GDP every year, this might already be a reality); everyone should be nicer to everyone else. Consider that list of my ‘druthers. There are two ways that I can entertain them. One, as a wish list: wouldn’t it be nice if matters were such that I was more, or better yet, fully, satisfied with regard to all of these elements. Two, I hereby advocate that force be used to these ends; that people be compelled to tune in baroque music, play handball, and be prohibited from doing all these other things on the “bad” side of my compilation. I admit to the first, and regard the second as unjust. Four Arrows, you, too, have a list of ‘druthers. I’ll now compile at least part of it for you; I’ll include only those elements pertaining to the subject of this chapter. I base this on our telephone calls, what you have so far contributed to this chapter and our letters to each other during the process of collaborating on this book. Here goes: People shouldn’t engage in wasteful practices. For example, we should not consume more than we need in extreme ways. Using more water than is ecological (everything from home use to golf courses and beyond shouldn’t occur). “…material goods and services have become valued excessively.” We should “simplify…, reducing the consumption of material goods.” If I have misinterpreted your views on any of these goals, I write under correction. You, also, Four Arrows, can mean these claims in one of the two ways I mention above. If the first, then this is merely a “wish list” of yours you would like to see implemented. In this case, all I can say is “good luck,” and that your desires are rather different than mine. However, if you mean it in the second interpretation I offer above, then you and I must part company. If you had the power, and you forced people to live in the manner specified by these ‘druthers of yours, I would regard such an action as highly unjust; I would think of you as a dictator. In contrast, there are things for which I do advocate the use of compulsion, and I imagine you join me on these. People should be prohibited from engaging in them, and if they ignore this order of mine, severe physical sanctions (brute force) ought to be imposed upon them. For instance, crimes such as murder, rape, theft, trespass, assault and battery, pollution (subject to the qualifications mentioned in Rothbard, 1982), fraud, kidnapping, arson, enslavement, etc., ought to be stopped cold in their tracks. So, which is it, Four Arrows? I would be mightily interested in your answer to this question. Should wastrels, golfers, users of excessive amounts of water, other resources, etc., be locked up, or, are they merely people you dislike, but would allow to continue in this vein, even had you the power to stop them by force? You ask, “Would you say that overconsumption of hamburgers … have nothing to do with an ‘overly materialistic’ culture?” Answer is, well, I suppose, that based on your tastes, this is true. But not on mine. 70

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An interesting hamburger controversy is now taking place in Canada (Henheffer, 2010): Tofino, B.C., is a tiny surfer town full of independent coffee shops, greasy spoons and eco-clothing boutiques, and its residents want to keep it that way. So, last week, the town council unanimously passed a motion asking city staff to come up with a way to keep large franchises – like Starbucks, WalMart and McDonald’s – out. “We want to be reflective of the environment in which we live, which is wild, untamed and thus different,” says Maureen Fraser, owner of the Common Loaf, a local bakery and hippie hangout. “There’s no sense of escape if you find the golden arches.” Four Arrows, how do you regard this attempt on the part of Tofino to ban by law these “overly materialistic” franchisers? That is, if they persist in buying some land, setting up shop, etc., throwing them in jail for such actions? My view is clear. This is a despicable violation of rights. It is simply unjust to prohibit these companies from offering burgers for sale. If Miss Fraser is correct, no one will purchase any, and the newly open fast food emporiums will have to go bankrupt, since they cannot satisfy the types of hippie demand for food prevalent in that small town. But, isn’t it the right of McDonalds and these others to test out Miss Fraser’s theory? I don’t yet know about your answer to this question, but there is no doubt that many opponents of libertarianism do look upon wastrels (of the hamburger variety or not) as criminals. You state that “materialism” and “over consumption” have been brought about “under the influence of Western and especially American capitalism,” that “material goods and services have become valued excessively.” You point to the “profit motive and the ability of large amounts of money to inspire people to buy more and more.” You further ask: “Overconsumption by one group can lead to underconsumption by another in ways that are doing violence to the have-nots. Such violence, as you recall, is an SEEJ problem. Do you disagree with this idea?” This bodes ill for my theory that you are in accord with me in that these acts are merely unwise, or distasteful, but not crimes. I do agree with you that justice is at stake here, but disagree with you that “materialists,” “over consumers,” wastrels, etc., have perpetrated a crime on those “have-nots” who suffer from “underconsumption,” and therefore ought to be stopped through the use of violence. As I interpret you, Four Arrows, you are claiming that the rich are rich because the poor are poor. Or, that there is a fixed pie “out there,” and if some get more of it, others must necessarily have less of it. In economics, this is called a “zero sum game,” and the capitalist system is indeed often blamed for this sort of thing. However, I can’t see my way clear to accepting the validity of this charge. Williams (2010), explains: Different Americans have different and often intense preferences for all kinds of goods and services. Some of us have strong preferences for beer and distaste for wine while others have the opposite preference – strong preferences for wine and distaste for beer. Some of us hate three-piece suits and love blue 71

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jeans while others love three-piece suits and hate blue jeans. When’s the last time you heard of beer drinkers in conflict with wine drinkers, or three-piece suit lovers in conflict with lovers of blue jeans? It seldom if ever happens because beer and blue jean lovers get what they want. Wine and three-piece suit lovers get what they want and they all can live in peace with one another. It would be easy to create conflict among these people. Instead of free choice and private decision-making, clothing and beverage decisions could be made in the political arena. In other words, have a democratic majority-rule process to decide what drinks and clothing that would be allowed. Then we would see wine lovers organized against beer lovers, and blue jean lovers organized against three-piece suit lovers. Conflict would emerge solely because the decision was made in the political arena. Why? The prime feature of political decision-making is that it’s a zero-sum game. One person’s gain is of necessity another person’s loss. That is if wine lovers won, beer lovers lose. As such, political decision-making and allocation of resources is conflict enhancing while market decision-making and allocation is conflict reducing. The greater the number of decisions made in the political arena, the greater the potential for conflict. Take the issue of prayers in school as an example. I think that everyone, except a maniacal tyrant, would agree that a parent has the right to decide whether his child will recite a morning prayer in school. Similarly, a parent has a right to decide that his child will not recite a morning prayer. Conflict arises because schools are government owned. That means it is a political decision whether prayers will be permitted or not. A win for one parent means a loss for another parent. The losing parent, in order to get what he wants, would have to muster up private school tuition while continuing to pay taxes for a school for which he has no use. If education were only government financed, as opposed to being government financed and produced, say through education vouchers, the conflict would be reduced. Both parents could have their wishes fulfilled by enrolling their child in a private school of their choice and instead of being enemies, they could be friends. The zero sum criticism of markets, in my opinion, overlooks the fact that the capitalist system is productive. Under its aegis, the pie actually increases. So, it is not necessarily true that the rich gain their wealth at the expense of the poor. In all honest dealings, both parties to a commercial interaction – rich and poor, male and female, employer and employee, buyer and seller – gain. It is only under crony capitalism (note the example of Miss Fraser, hamburger mercantilist) that this is not true. That is why I lay such great emphasis on “good” corporations vis a vis “bad” ones. Let us review how one can become rich under free enterprise. Consider a worker. He earns $100 per day. He spends only $80 during that time. He saves the rest. Eventually it amounts to $10,000. He quits his job, and sets out on his own account. He buys fruit baskets at $10, and sells them for $12. Does he “exploit” the purchasers of these items? Of course not. They are perfectly willing to buy from him, he 72

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doesn’t not force them to do so. They value what they buy from this new entrepreneur at more than the purchase price of $12, so they, too, earn a profit. Eventually our man does so well, he expands his business. He buys some land, and hires some workers. Since there these are voluntary transactions, we may deduce there was mutual gain (always in the ex ante sense, and, usually, in the ex post as well) in them too. This guy’s firm gets bigger and bigger. Eventually, he is filthy rich. Did he impoverish anyone else at any step in this process? No. He operated entirely within what Oppenheimer (1914) calls the “economic means.” In sharp contrast, very sharp contrast indeed, there is an entirely different kind of businessman. He obtains his start up capital from the government. He successfully lobbies for more subsidies from that source, and for special laws handcuffing his competitors; again see the case of Miss Fraser, of anti McDonald’s fame. (A particularly egregious example of this sort of thing is President Lynden Baines Johnson; he worked all his life in politics, at relatively modest salaries; and yet he retired a fabulously wealthy man, based on government largesse that flowed to him, thanks to his direction). He becomes wealthy, not by enriching all of his customers, but, rather, by forcing them to pay him via the government tax-subsidy system what they were unwilling to offer him, directly, for his wares. In this case, your concern: “Overconsumption by one group can lead to underconsumption by another in ways that are doing violence to the have-nots. Such violence, as you recall, is an SEEJ problem” is entirely justified. My problem with you, Four Arrows, is that you do not sufficiently distinguish between these two very, very, very, very different type of “capitalists.” I applaud and defend the former type of businessman, and claim he is operating in a manner consistent with laissez faire capitalism, or free enterprise; he is a part of the free market system. The second, I totally condemn as a member in good standing of the state monopoly corporate capitalist model, as a perpetrator of economic fascism. I don’t know how I can better draw the absolutely crucial distinction between these different types of firms. Yes, I agree with you, there is a statistical correlation between size of firm and what Oppenheimer (1914) calls the “political means.” The bigger is a business, the more likely it is to partake of the evil type of capitalism. But there are exceptions. There is no necessary connection between size and “badness.” It is a bit like height and weight. These, too, are highly correlated with one another. But there is no necessary connection between the two of them. There are, after all, tall, thin people, and, also, short, fat ones. There are big bad corporations. I mentioned a few of them, previously. There are small evil ones, too, such as the “Common Loaf, a local bakery and hippie hangout” in Tofino, Canada. There are totally legitimate tiny firms. And, there are very big ones, too, that act in a manner fully compatible with the libertarian code. Yes, I haven’t been able, yet, to give you any examples of these that you accept. I intend to pound away at this in our chapter on economics. For the moment, I ask you to accept that there could be such an entity; that mere large size is not a per se violation of proper law. If you cannot see your way to agreeing with me on this, then let me ask you a question: what is it about (the large) size of a corporation that renders it illicit in your view, given that it does things no different 73

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than when it was small (and hence legitimate in your view?). Or does doing the same thing on a large scale amount to a difference in kind? Please explain. I am very interested in your views on this question. Let’s discuss a specific issue of so called wastage, golf courses. Just how many golf courses do you think there should be, ideally? Zero? And, is this a mere part of your wish list, your ‘druthers, or, would you use compulsion to ban them all? As for me, I adopt a totally laissez faire attitude toward these amenities. I myself do not play golf; I regard it as a sissy “sport.” But, as far as the law is concerned, it should allow people to use their own land, or land they voluntary purchase, for any non invasive purpose they wish. But, are golf courses invasive? Well, yes, sometimes. Their extensive use of water is often heavily subsidized by the sort of government water pricing policies I mention above. In such cases, the answer is not to ban golf courses; rather, it is to make them pay their full way; confront them with market prices for this liquid. But, this can only be done when water is fully privatized. What objection do you have to a golf course that pays its full way regarding its water bill, that does not allow runoff of chemicals to keep the grass green onto the property of any other person? Is it because it is so luxurious? Then, would you ban by law private jets, Rolls Royce automobiles, Stradivarius violins, diamond bracelets? A is head over heels in love with his wife, B. For him, she is a luxury, a jewel valuable beyond price (I am being poetic here). She is worth more than rubies. A wouldn’t give up B for al the law private jets, Rolls Royce automobiles, Stradivarius violins, diamond bracelets in the world. If you were rigorously logically consistent, your anathema for luxurious golf courses would lead to a prohibition of the marriage of A and B. Surely, you wouldn’t go that far. But, where is the error in my attempted reductio? You ask: “Would you say that such a demand for products, motivated by industry creating the consumer needs as much as the consumer wanting them independently, has had anything to do with deforestation?” We part company, here, in two regards. First, a high demand for wood, has nothing to do with deforestation, any more than does a high demand for milk have to do with the (non) disappearance of milk, any more than does a high demand for rap “music” have to do with the (non) disappearance of rap music. In fact, the very opposite effect follows increased demand, when there is at least a semblance of private property rights, as there are in cases such as cars, computers, coffee, and most other goods. That is, when demand for an item increases, profits in providing it rise, and entrepreneurs scurry to earn these profits (let us always remember the invisible hand). How can they do so? Why, by supplying more of the item in greater demand. True, this takes a bit more time in the case of trees. They take a long time to grow to maturity. But, planting them occurs relatively quickly. We are never in equilibrium in the real world, but we are always tending in that direction. As for the complaint about “industry creating … consumer needs” this is a criticism against the free enterprise system most famously penned by Galbraith (1958). Hayek (1961) completely and totally obliterated Galbraith on this point. Of course, industry, and other cultural leaders, create wants in us. Our desire for the music of Mozart, for example, is a completely “contrived” need. We do not come 74

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out of the womb with a demand for this consumer particular product. Apart from “The innate wants (for) food shelter, and sex,” Hayek tells us, our entire civilization rests on this sort of thing. Are we to jettison all other desires because they were only developed in us by observation of the world around us, which includes people continually coming up with new products, and trying to convince us they will improve the quality of our lives? Industry “created” in us a desire to have computers, shoe laces, movies, cars, the list goes on. Happily for the Galbraithians, there is much less of this sort of thing going on in North Korea. SEEJ IN HIGHER EDUCATION

Yes, I certainly concede to you, Four Arrows, that it would be a good thing for universities to not only make their students aware of the truths of free market environmentalism, as I have tried to sketch them out above, but also of the many criticisms that have been launched against it. I am a firm believer in Mill’s (1859) view that students should hear both sides of all issues, so that they make up their own minds. And, as Mill says, they should hear them from advocates who really believe in them: Nor is it enough that he should hear the arguments of adversaries from his own teachers, presented as they state them, and accompanied by what they offer as refutations. That is not the way to do justice to the arguments, or bring them into real contact with his own mind. He must be able to hear them from persons who actually believe them; who defend them in earnest, and do their very utmost for them. He must know them in their most plausible and persuasive form; he must feel the whole force of the difficulty which the true view of the subject has to encounter and dispose of; else he will never really possess himself of the portion of truth which meets and removes that difficulty. It is too bad that most college students, and, indeed, professors, are unaware of the arguments of free market environmentalism, since academia does not much welcome supporters of free enterprise on its faculty, a point I tried to make in the last chapter. I certainly do agree with you “that some discussion about the pros and cons in light of the historical record” would be very desirable. I am somewhat uncomfortable with the distinction you make between “theory” and “reality,” as in: X is true in theory, but not reality. A theory is supposed to be about reality. If it is “true” only in theory, but not in reality, then it is not true in theory either. I won’t comment on your linking me with your “Christian fundamentalist cousin.” Let me just say that many people would regard that as insulting, as I would in most other contexts, but I know you do not mean it in that way. I do not at all “think private possession of land is sacred.” I think, rather, it is both ethically justified, and economically efficacious. You say, “… both your libertarian and my Indigenous worldview also reject central government, hierarchal structures, and regulations on liberties. So in a way our ultimate goals are similar.” Apart from hierarchal structures, which I am indifferent to (if they arise out of voluntary agreement, I support them, otherwise, not) I do agree with you that there is a core 75

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of overlap between us. We both oppose initiatory violence, for example, which I regard as the pre eminent building block of all of political economy. I sometimes think we are on the same wavelength, and are only kept apart due to the very different way we understand some words (“capitalism”). But, I think, this back and forth procedure we have adopted for this collaborative book effort ought to eventually iron out mere verbal disputes. Never fear, my friend, we will eventually achieve “real disagreement,” and then, hopefully, come closer together on some issues, and, on others, agree to politely and respectfully disagree. I am also in enthusiastic agreement that our book should include at least a chapter where we “research and dialogue about the Indigenous way.” Four Arrows, we both agree that it is improper to initiate violence against innocent people, or to steal their property, invade it, trespass upon it. I claim that this logically implies acceptance of the institution of private property rights. Yet, you favour the former, but in this chapter are highly suspicious of the latter, if not downright dismissive of it. Why do I claim that property rights logically follow from the non aggression principle of libertarianism? Because they are opposite sides of the same coin. Consider the following case. We see A grabbing the backpack worn by B, and running off with it. Is this a case of theft? Well, it sure seems like it. But if yesterday B stole this backpack from A, and today A is only repossessing his own property, then A’s act certainly does not constitute theft. Rather, it is compatible with the libertarian emphasis on making victims whole, and returning stolen property. So, whether or not a given act counts as stealing depends, totally, crucially, intimately, on the private property rights in question. OTHER REMARKS

On the issue of human nature, I am a student of sociobiology, or evolutionary psychology. Its main message, as I understand it, is that we are now the way we are, to a great degree, because of what it took for our forbears to pass on their genes to us millions of years ago. Thus, none of us are afraid of bathtubs, and all of us fear snakes, because there was a premium placed on this attitude in our pre history. That is, fear of snakes had survival benefits, and better enabled us to make replicas of ourselves; bathtubs played no such role in pre historic times. This is true, even though, nowadays, these bathroom fixtures kill far more of us than the creatures that slide. I don’t really think that my “trust in libertarianism somehow relates to (a) positive view of humans.” I see our species as filled with many kind people, and happily, only a few really malevolent ones. But ignorance is a great problem and there are sociobiological reasons why this should be the case. You are no doubt correct in seeing in both of us opposition to “coercion from any source..., whether a powerful and wealthy capitalist, a government official or a ‘bleeding heart liberal.’” But, the devil is in the details, precisely what we are now trying to encounter. If we are to achieve real disagreement, which, so far, in my opinion, we have not yet attained, you must realize that I do not at all favor “capitalism as it has generally been practiced.” I tried to make this distinction with my examples of good and bad corporations, but that did not work too well with you 76

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(I shall try again in our chapter on economics.) It sounds a bit perverse to try to attain “real disagreement,” given that the animating philosophy of this book is not so much that we disagree with each other, but, rather, have a cordial exchange where we each try to “walk in the other fellow’s moccasins,” to see if we can attain insight into the others’ viewpoint, with a view toward reconciliation. But, this is not perverse. In order to promote this mutual goal of ours, we must first accurately understand what the other guy stands for, how he thinks. If you are of the opinion that I favor “capitalism as it is generally been practiced” then there is no hope for us. No hope whatsoever. Very much to the contrary, I see “capitalism as it is generally been practiced” as containing large elements of out and out fascism, and I see this as one of the polar opposites of what I as a libertarian favor (the other polar opposite is of course socialism.) A FEW MORE ENVIRONMENTAL TOPICS

I now conclude by addressing a few more important ecological issues. Global Warming Should the forces of law and order compel people to act so as to not add to global warming? As a confessed non meteorologist, I am rather sceptical about this entire initiative. In the 1970s, the scholars who are now concerned about global warming were instead warning us about anthropogenic global cooling. And, nowadays, these Chicken Littles, having been once too often been forced to cancel their luxurious jet setting meetings decrying warming, due to severe snowfalls and record low temperatures, have, instead, resorted to weather change as the bogeyman. Well, like the stock market, Fahrenheit recordings do vary. It hardly seems reasonable to use something that will likely inevitably occur in any case as a stick with which to beat up on free enterprise. There is also the problem that the success enjoyed by meteorologists in predicting the weather for the next day or week is less than scintillating. The global warming (a thousand pardons, change) fear mongers are attempting to peer into the future 100 years from now. If they can’t predict in the short term, how can they possibly do so in the long run? The response to this, that the latter is the realm of climatologists, not weathermen, seems singularly unpersuasive. As it happens, the latter are sceptics about the claims of the former (Kaufman, 2010). Then there is the fact that, to a rank outsider such as myself, if there are two contending parties, and one of them castigates the other as “deniers,” pretty much refuses to debate with its advocates, and claims that the “science is settled,” well, I naturally incline in the other direction. In physics, there is a debate between those who say matter is akin to a wave, and others to a particle. Neither denigrates the other in the way that the warmers/changers/coolers do their critics. So, my stance is total uncertainty on this controversy in physics; I am an agnostic. Not so, regarding the temperature debate. Then, too, the chief spokesman for this “settled science” view is Al Gore. I use his book (Gore, 1992) in my environmental courses (I am a fan of balance in 77

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presentation, a la John Stuart Mill) and have thus dealt with, oh, some dozen times. Since the readership of the book we are now writing is a general one, I cannot give my full (expletive included) views of Gore (1992); suffice it to say that I am very much unimpressed by it. But, I am certainly open to the possibility of this hypothesis being true, and that therefore this claim justifies compulsion to stop the ruination of the planet, that is, a mass violation of property rights. What would it take to convince me? First, the burden of proof must always rest with he who wishes to overturn extant property rights, as in this case with all sorts of new regulations and infringements on them. How can this burden be met? The alarmists must begin by specifying what the proper temperature is. This, they have never done, even though it is incumbent upon them to do so. Then, they must prove that any deviation from this proper range is man-made, and point to which specific people are the guilty parties; they must prove that other possible causal agents (sunspots, the gigantic swings of the past emanating from uncertain antecedents) are not responsible. They will have to demonstrate the contrary to fact conditional that there has been more warming (or change, or cooling, whatever is the charge du jour) due to man’s presence on the planet and misbehavior that would otherwise have taken place. Maybe, one day, this burden will be met. But, in my estimation, it will take a generation and more for the scholars in this field to recover from that stupendous fall from scientific probity called “climategate.” Ozone Dissipation According to the critics of capitalism, the ozone layer has been partially destroyed, due to the use of underarm deodorants and air conditioners, among other things. This layer protects us from cancer and other dread diseases. If so, this would certainly constitute a rights violation. It would be as if people were walking around with umbrellas, to ward off ultraviolet cancer causing rays, and some thief came along and relieved them of this protection. I pass over, as a non physical scientist, the claim that the ozone layer has been thinned out, mostly, over, of all places, Antarctica, where are precious few deodorant dispensers, and, possibly, even fewer air conditioners. The main difficulty with this charge is that it has not at all met its burden of proof either in terms of depletion of ozone, nor that this has had human antecedents. Given the parlous state of this science, climategate once again rears its ugly head, it is exceedingly unlikely that this burden will be met, at least not in the near term. Running Out of Resources What about dire shortages of resources such as oil, wood, coal, precious metals, food, whatever; is this likely? The main culprit in creating and perpetrating this scare tactic is Meadows, et al. (1972, 64–67 tbl.4, 71) which predicted a desperate (arable) land shortage before the year 2000; that we would run short of gold by 1979, of silver and mercury by 1983, of petroleum by 1990, of zinc by 1988, of tin by 1985 and of natural gas by 1992. Despite these wildly inaccurate assessments, the neo Malthusians (1798) still delight in attempting to scare the unwary. 78

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Happily, there is a large literature debunking these myths (Kozinski, 2002, who criticizes these wildly mistaken predictions; Featherstone, 2005; Kelly, 2008; Lilley, 2009; Rostan, 2009, Lomborg, 2004). Perhaps the greatest comeuppance against a Malthusian was the famous bet made between Paul Ehrlich and Julian Simon (Kedrosky, 2010). Both agreed that if a market basket of goods chosen by the two of them rose in price (by the end of the specified time period), this would demonstrate relative scarcity; if it fell, relative superfluity. Free market environmentalist Simon won, as prices fell. The mistake made by those who fear that we will “run out of resources,” is that any tendency in this direction will raise the price of them. And this will have several salutary effects, all of them in the direction of alleviating the original problem, if ever it truly existed. First, at the increased cost, fewer people would purchase the commodities (demand curves slope in a downward direction, after all). Second, the higher prices would yield greater profits (please note, here is yet another demonstration of the beneficial effects of profit) and this would lead manufacture